That energy drink had gone straight thru him. This is why he bought the cheap ones - the cheapest ones the service station had - like 49p a can - because they were all the same. Why waste a couple of quid on a Red Bull when he just wanted - needed - the caffeine and he’d be pissing it out half an hour later anyway?

 

Gareth glanced at the satnav. Middle of chuffing nowhere. Of course. Next pitstop would be another 45 minutes, at least, but nature was calling. Nature was ringing the phone of the hook. No use for it; he slowed down and pulled over.

 

The sun was just starting to rise. This was the one thing Gareth enjoyed about his early mornings. The dew, the fog, the cold clean air, and that first golden light. The world waking from slumber. It was beautiful - and he wasn’t a poetic man, his wife’d never describe him as romantic - but he knew that this was beautiful. 

 

The sun was shining so perfectly through the leaves this morning that he almost forgot for a moment why he’d parked, why he’d gotten out the car. And then the urge returned - fast and sharp - and he scampered off into the bushes, found a good spot [just in case anyone else should drive past] and began to relieve himself into a tangle of weeds and dead branches.

 

And that’s when he saw it first. 

 

In the middle distance, through the trees, in a sort of grove only a few paces away. His eyes adjusted to it without even meaning, alerted by the presence of something unusual - something that should not be there - in the otherwise peaceful woodland. 

 

He did up his fly and decided to take a closer look, pushing through the branches, stepping over the twisting nettles at his feet. He stopped a few steps away from it; he didn’t want to get any closer. No, not yet. He could see just fine from here.

 

There it was. It was a suitcase. Medium-sized, black, lying on its side. Zipped up. It was covered in a thick hide of moss and lichen, a toxic green in the warm light. It was almost glowing, he thought. 

 

It had obviously been here a long time, for stuff to grow on it like that. But why here? Dumped in the heart of the countryside, miles from anyway, away from the road? This was some dedicated flytipping. This was hurried. This was wrong. 

 

Of course, he wanted to open it. If this was a movie or a story and the protagonist was hesitating, faffing about like this, he’d be shouting at the telly, rolling his eyes. ‘Open it! Go on - just fucking open it!’ 

 

But it was different here, now, in real life. He should open it, yes, why not. But he found that he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. Like a field - some sort of barrier - was stopping him. Anything could be in there. Anyone. Because obviously that’s where your mind goes, when confronted with something like this. 

 

He’d seen a show on Netflix not too long ago, a documentary, about this guy who got killed by his flatmate and he’d got chopped up in the bathtub and stuck in a suitcase just like this one but red [or perhaps it’d been purple?] and then just left it out by the bins like any other rubbish. And these images - the bloodied bathroom tiles, the over-exposed police photos of the suitcase, the mugshot of the killer - they all returned to Gareth now as he stood in that glade with the birds singing overhead and the sun breaking through the top of the trees and the most gentle of breezes - - 

 

The suitcase stared at him. It screamed a sickening silence. It challenged him - open me, you coward, unzip me and see what’s within. 

 

But Gareth couldn’t - he could not - because he knew - he just knew - that whatever was inside was doom and oblivion and the worst thing imaginable - -  

 

Gareth ran back to the car and drove away. 

 

He drove fast and he drove long. And as he drove his heart rate slowed, and the pull of the mossy suitcase in the middle of the woods ebbed further and further away from the forefront of his mind.

 

 

 

His company had booked him into a Premier Inn with a lovely view of an industrial estate. All that scenic countryside in this part of the world and of course some temp had decided on this. There’d better be a good breakfast. And he would definitely have a go at the mini-bar in the fridge. 

 

He would usually have a good long soak in the tub after drives like that, let his back ease out a little. But tonight he found the idea unsettling - 

​

a flash - quickly - but just enough - of the true crime documentary - the body in the bath 

 

- and so he opted on quick shower, blazing hot, but hopefully enough to steam the stress out of him.

 

He fell asleep in his towel watching an old cowboy movie, a tiny unopened bottle of whisky by his side. 

 

 

 

When Gareth woke, the room felt different. 

 

Maybe that’s why he woke - suddenly, sharply, as though the very air had shifted. The light felt strange. The TV had gone to static, throwing harsh blue-shadows across the room, turning the familiar alien. 

 

Out the corner of his eye he saw it. Something - 

 

something was huddled on the floor just beyond the end of the bed.  He could see it. Breath catches in his throat, pulse instantly races. He tastes bitter adrenaline in his mouth as he cranes to see. 

 

His sight adjusted, defining the dark mass into what it truly was: the suitcase. The one from the woods. Glowing green, lying on its side, zip lolling, inviting to be pulled open. Mocking him. The whole thing seemed to boom with a terrible enormous power. 

 

Gareth cried out, thrashing his arm in front of him, as if to swat the sight away. His hand hit the lamp by the bed, he shrieked in pain - - !

 

 

 

and he woke up. 

 

He truly woke up. The room was as he remembered, as it should be. No suitcase. The only weirdness was the bedside lamp he’d bashed from its position which now lay on the floor, still rocking. 

 

 

 

His alarm sounds at 4am. He’s up and out by 5, an undercooked but satisfying enough full english in his belly. He buys a coffee-to-go at a vending machine in the hotel lobby, checks out, and gets into his car. 

 

Another long day of driving stretches ahead. 

 

The radio’s on - 80s power ballads or something - normally he’d be singing along, badly and loudly but happy and carefree. Not this morning. He’s disturbed; the night’s events have disturbed him. He tries but he cannot purge the image of the suitcase from his head. 

 

It sits there. Patient. Inevitable. 

 

Gareth finds himself questioning. Questioning many things: 

 

is this really what he wants to do with his life? Driving up and down the country, selling power tools at dreary conventions? It was fine for a while - decent money, and better than stuck behind a desk - but so many days away from home? Long lonely nights in hotels, when he could be sleeping by his wife, and a room away their four-month old daughter dreaming softly..? 

 

It was getting to him. Obviously; the stress of it was tearing up his mind. He resolved, as he pulled off the motorway and back into the rolling countryside, that this - yes - this would be the last time. 

 

When this trip was done he’d ask to sit down with his boss. No, he’d demand it. He’d ask to change department. He’d spent more time at home, with his family. From today his life would change, forever - - 

 

 

 

There was a young man, standing in the road. Gareth almost ran him over, he’d been so engrossed in his thoughts. Thankfully the coffee had kept his reflexes slick; the brakes screeched. The car jolted to a stop. 

 

The young man seemed unperturbed at nearly becoming roadkill; he smiled a toothy grin as he jogged over to the passenger door and pulled it open. He was odd-looking: patchy moth-eaten jumper a little too tight, greasy battered windbreaker, thick petri-dish glasses and a severe centre parting gelled to kingdom come. 

 

‘Hey! Any chance of a lift?’ And his voice was a little too high.  ‘Mister? Are you alright? Mister - ?’

 

‘I’m fine,’ Gareth said. He sounded unsure so he coughed, cleared his throat, tried again. ‘I’m fine. Just didn’t expect to see anyone out here, ’specially this early.’

 

The hitchhiker laughed. ‘Oh I’m an early-riser. Up with the larks! Literally. I’m a photographer, see -’ He held up a very professional-looking camera that was bobbing around on a strap about his neck. ‘Wildlife. Mainly birds.

 

I - I got lost, out on the marshes there - I’m - well, I’m not from around here, stupid really - embarrassing - to wander without a map - but when - when I heard your car coming I thought “thank christ!” So: any chance you could drop me in the next town..?’

 

Why did Gareth feel so nervous? He could feel his unease, roiling up inside him. Any other day he’d have already said yes and the kid would be in the car. Yet he felt - he felt… something was not quite right, and it unnerved him. 

 

‘Mister? Please, I’ll only get more lost if I try and retrace my - look I’ve got some cash if you - ’

 

‘No no, it’s fine, it’s okay -’ This was ridiculous. Pull yourself together! Gareth barked at himself internally. Even considering abandoning this youngster [how old was he? Like 19? 20? At least half his age certainly], leaving him out here in the back of beyond - had he forgotten himself - - ?? 

 

‘Yeh sure get in get in, just move the stuff on the seat.’

 

The boy gushed some thank yous. His attention suddenly went to the screwdriver and hammer lying on the passenger seat. 

 

Gareth sighed. ‘I’m a salesman. Tools. I travel around, show off samples. Just chuck them anywhere.’

 

The hitchiker picked up the hammer and screwdriver and tossed them onto the backseat. As he went to clamber into the car he suddenly paused - ‘Wait!! Sorry. I almost forgot my stuff! Just a mo -’

 

He ran off to the hedgerow a few yards away, retrieving a big backpack, slinging it over one shoulder. With the other hand he picked up a suitcase - a medium-sized black suitcase - and raced back over to the car. He opened the back door and shuffled the things inside. 

 

Gareth’s blood had ran cold, frozen as soon as he’d set eyes on that suitcase. It was - but it couldn’t be - the one from the woods. Not overgrown, not lost and left but - but - it was the same. He just knew it. This was an absolute truth. 

 

‘Hey mister, are you - are you sure you’re okay - ?’

 

Gareth was not a romantic man but he was superstitious ; the fallout of a Catholic upbringing. The priests had put the fear of God into him early, taught him to see the darkness, the dread, in the world. It’d taken Gareth years to shake that off. But now, looking into the rearview mirror, staring at that suitcase sitting there… 

 

The evil pulsed off it like a heat. It prickled his skin. It seemed to want to burn him. Certainly to hurt him. Ask yesterday if he believed in premonitions he’d have scoffed; ask him now - - 

 

‘What’s in the suitcase?’ Gareth said suddenly. 

 

‘What? Erm it’s - it’s just my - ’

​

‘What’s in the fucking suitcase?!’ Gareth screamed, surprising himself but shocking the boy more. The hitchhiker’s eyes were wide pools of fear as he fumbled for the door handle. 

 

‘Look look I’m sorry mister I’m sorry this was obviously a mistake I - ’

 

Gareth grabbed the kid’s wrist, the strength of his grip bleaching it white. The boy writhed and lashed out, shouting out ‘STOP! STOP! LEMME GO!’ 

 

But Gareth would not. He was still shouting, shouting at the boy: ‘what are you some sort of psycho?! Out here “photographing birds?” Pull the other one. Lying in wait more likely, for a good samaritan like me to come along and pick you up. What was the plan? Wait till we drove a little further and then bash me over the head? Is that how you get your kicks? Your sick kicks? Is it? Is it?!?!’

 

The kid’s free hand went to his jacket, slipped inside. This is it, Gareth thought. This is the moment. The moment he pulls out the gun or the shiv or the needle full of poison and jabs it into my neck! 

 

BUT NO TODAY YOU MANIAC NO! Gareth was steely. Bold and resolute. NOT TODAY. He wouldn’t let his wife become a widow, his daughter doomed to never know him as anything but a gravestone, NO. He wouldn’t let this psychopath turn him to just another victim on a true crime documentary. 

 

Gareth swivelled fast in his seat, his arm lunging into the back of the car, and grabbed the hammer. He swung it back - hard - and it found the boy’s face. There was a wet smush as his nose squashed under the impact; an explosion of blood. 

 

Gareth struck again. And again. Again. Again. A crack of skull, and another and another. More blood, popping this way and that. The kid was struggling at first but not for long. The shock of it all, the savagery. His eyes were still quaking with confusion as Gareth brought the hammer down fast and final into the centre of his forehead. 

 

Then,

 

it was over.

 

Just the sound of heavy breathing - Gareth’s. The hitchhiker lay crumpled next to him, contorted and soaked through. His head was pummelled out of shape; Gareth couldn’t help but be reminded of raw mince.

 

He vomited then, straight onto his lap. Steaming coffee mixed with bile and bacon and baked beans and eggs. His eyes filled with tears. 

 

oh god

 

oh oh fuck  

 

oh christ what have I done?

 

 

 

It was a full moon that night, so the grove was lit well. Gareth remembered the spot from the morning before, just off the road but hidden enough from sight. 

 

He found the clearing and saw it was empty. No suitcase, only the one he was dragging behind him now.

 

But of course, he knew this would be how it was. Obviously. 

 

The suitcase wouldn’t stand up straight - its contents had been packed carelessly; compacted too tightly - so it toppled onto its side. He left it that way. He walked off in another direction for a few minutes, scooped out a hole in the dirt by a felled oak - scooped it out with his hands - and in it he buried the bloodied hammer and the handsaw he’d used to divide the boy’s body.

 

When this was done he returned to the car, and drove away. 

 

He drove fast, 

 

and he drove long. 

 

 

 

 

It’s been years now. Many. 

 

Gareth is older - he has a new job, behind a desk. But it’s a big desk, because it’s an important job. The kind that pays very well, enough to afford cool expensive cars to replace old battered ones that should be written off anyway. Crunched into metal cubes and dumped in scrapyards where no forensic teams will ever find them.

 

His job pays for his family to go on the best holidays; quality time with his wife and daughter, his daughter who is growing up so quickly. ‘We love your daddy,’ his wife says to his child as they all cuddle on the sofa of a night. ‘He works very hard and makes a lot of sacrifices for us.’ 

 

 

 

One sacrifice in particular returns to Gareth, every night. Every time he closes his eyes. Something money can never buy him - absolution. 

 

And so, in his dreams, he goes back there. To the woods, to the sunlit grove in the early morning, and watches the suitcase lying there, stuffed with its terrible secrets.

 

He watches it gather moss. 

 

He prays it will never be opened. 

​

​

While shooting a werewolf movie in Cornwall, a box of werewolf heads we were using went missing one night. Stolen. Determined to find them, myself and two of the other actors embarked on an early morning expedition, prowling through the misty hedgerows in the Back of Beyond to try and locate them.

​

We never found the heads [another story for another time], but we did find a moss-covered, lichen-crusted suitcase far off the road in a leafy glade. We were too afraid to zip it open and see what secrets it held. 

​

I wrote this story not long after.