Insanitorium (Paperback)

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1. Mason

Shaking his head and rubbing one hand across his face, Mason Blair stuffed the work order for Daggermouth Asylum into the back pocket of his Wranglers. Mason had seen some shitholes in his time, but Daggermouth was the worst of the lot.
Surrounded by a rusting and misshapen wrought iron fence, the decaying asylum, abandoned for decades, loomed like a dark stain at the water’s edge, as if the mental fractures the structure had once born witness to were now a physical manifestation, at one with the brickwork. That didn’t include whatever surprises were left patched up or hidden in one of the wings. A fire had rampaged through the building some years back, but only a section had burned before the flames got put out. That section was on the work order, but Mason had no idea what he would find until he started peeling back the layers. All he knew was that the fire had kept the facility closed all these years.
Oddly, the asylum’s decline was indicative of its surroundings, an echo of the past in a lonely, broken town in a corner of the world best left forgotten. Shattered glass and collapsed masonry littered the overgrown crab grass and goat heads that thrived around Daggermouth’s barren shell, threatening to swallow the aging building whole, as it had the moldy unmarked gravestones of the asylum’s tenants. Beyond the stones was the crippled remains of a pergola, where only the five concrete anchors remained in a pentagram of ruin. In its center, a concrete plug lurked over a hole in the earth nicknamed “Satan’s blowhole.” 
And were a trespasser to it make it past the gazebo down the caliche drive, they would be met by massive wooden doors reinforced with rusted iron strips, bolted down by nuts the size of plums and tied off, for good measure, with a magnificent chain pulled taut by an ancient lock.
Why anyone would want to restore such an irreparable slum was beyond Mason, but where some saw a black spot on the face of history, others foolishly saw opportunity.
The work order for Daggermouth’s restoration had been waiting for him, pinned to the door by its proprietor, Carson, a man whom Mason had never spoken to and had never seen. Business had been conducted via a newspaper ad, then through a letter via courier service, letting him know that Carson had accepted his bid for the work. Mason didn’t bat an eye at the theatrics; stranger things had happened to less fortunate people. 
The work order on the door was written proof that not everyone believed the rumors about Daggermouth.
Wiping sweat from under weary eyes with his fingertips, Mason raised the massive bolt cutters he held to the chain securing the door. The proprietor could have left a key, but Mason’s instructions had been clear: cut the lock.
Amid the low roar of bugs chittering in the tall grass, footsteps crunched across the caliche and stopped just behind Mason as he visualized the lock popping open.
He lodged the tool between a particularly gnarly-looking bolt, wedged a link of the chain between the jaws, and pressed, leaning into it, his arms wobbling and his teeth gritted so hard that he thought they might shatter.
Mason let out a controlled hiss, straining against the metal, until his head pounded and the veins in his arms bulged.
“Looks tough,” the observer said casually, his lips smacking as he noisily ate something, the very sound annoying when Mason was already irritated by the stubborn steel he was trying in vain to cut through.
“Shut the fuck up and help, Jenny.” 
Mason dropped the bolt cutters to the already weak concrete beneath the awning, which crumbled and chipped easily with the impact. Despite the shade from an overhang that could easily have fit six cars bumper to bumper, prickly heat ran down Mason’s back.
“Call me Jenny again and I’ll take something off you with them cutters you can’t grow back.”
“Fine, Corey. Mind fuckin’ helping me?” 
Mason grunted, twisted around, and rested his back against the door. He could feel the layers of chipped paint scratching at his shirt, white at some point, now brown and blackened with mold.
Corey sighed and settled next to him. Both men stared at the gates, undoubtedly sharing the same feelings. Their thoughts electrified the air between them, causing it to hum. You’re in over your heads …
“Maybe this is a sign,” Corey suggested. “You got the money before the work even started. Should have known the price was too perfect. You said it yourself, and I quote, ‘I’m in over my head.’ We’re blue collar guys, Mace, not fancy house flippers with an itch. What are we doing here, man?” 
This wasn’t the first time the two of them had butted heads, which was how Mason knew that Corey wasn’t done yet.
“And you said …”
Here it comes, you annoying little prick. “And I quote …” 
“And I quote, ‘This is it now. This job will be the last one. One more job, and we can buy another truck. We buy another truck, we run another team. We run another team … no more side jobs.”
“Yeah, I know.” Mason grunted. He was getting close to his limit with this shit for one day. His ass was chafing, and he didn’t want to be out past dark. The drive behind him still didn’t have power, and he’d over-estimated the drive, anyways. Daggermouth really was out yonder.
“Listen, brother. I’ve known you thirty-one years. Of those thirty-one, fifteen of them have been spent dreaming about MB Contracting. So far, we’ve done three houses and an old apartment. Why, suddenly, did we think we can take on this kind of job? Daggermouth is a beast.”
“First off, little brother, you haven’t ‘known me’ thirty-one years …”
“Whatever, man. I know you better than anyone, and I know something happened.”
“How’d you figure that?”
“It just is, like me being the better-looking of us both. It’s subtle, but other people notice, you know …”
“We look identical!”
Mason couldn’t hold it. He burst into laughter: sonorous belly laughs that droned out the bugs and filled his well of patience once again. “Okay, Lightener.”
Mason called Corey “the lightener” on account of his ability to lighten any mood. In contrast, Mason wasn’t anywhere near as carefree about life, the realities of which dampened his demeanor and often led to rage.
“Okay, Frightener,” Corey said, firing back his usual reply.
Mason groaned, kicked off from the door, and snatched the bolt cutters again.
“How about you make yourself useful and go check the fuel level on the generator while I handle this? I want it set up in case we end up staying past dark. Hell, we might need it anyways with how these windows look.”
He motioned to the milky windows to his left and right, which appeared to belong to a reception area. Just as they had for years before now, the dull panes rejected the light.
“Sure thing.” 
Corey walked off around a yellowing panel van adorned with a livery of electrical tape lettering advertising MB Contracting—“MB” for Mason and Mitchell Blair. Mason handled most of the labor, while Mitch—who preferred his middle name, Corey—kept him sane on the job. His brother was a different kind of support; part moral, part advisory, Corey was a kindred lost soul, but he was only working with Mason in the short term.
Mason’s shoulders slumped. Family was family, and working with what you had was all he knew how to do. That memory drove a cold spike through his heart, and with it ebbed the familiar feeling of loss and regret. 
As Mason pushed against the bolt cutters, the chain clinked and groaned, as if it existed solely to ward him off. 
Feeling his anger swelling, Mason growled at the obstinate chain, but more so at the asylum’s proprietor, some high-rolling asshole who was too stupid—or too arrogant—to leave a damn key.
Seconds before giving up, he felt the blade of the bolt cutters finally tear through the metal, a smooth depression followed by a pop and a clank as the lock fell away and the chain slid from around the door handles and spooled at his feet. Mason tossed the bolt cutters in triumph at the door.
“Fuck you, fuck you, I got you,” he whispered to it menacingly.
“Easy, Mace. Can’t bulldoze your way through everything, brother.”
Mason turned to Corey, who held a sweating bottle of beer out to him. Mason snagged it, broke the top off with his keys, and slammed it back between breaths. He went back for a second and a third gulp before meeting Corey’s eye.
“What?” Mason asked. “Something on my face?”
Corey lifted his eyebrows. “You know I’ve got to say it, man. If this place is too much … I mean, if there’s too much for us to handle, you need to back out. You need to back out so we don’t go under. You can’t rage your way out of your problems.”
Mason’s initial urge was to slap Corey, maybe toss the beer aside and tackle him in a brotherly squabble until he gave up and backed off. But Mason resisted, instead looking for the finer points in what Corey had to say. That was why Corey was here, after all. Mason did just fine with the insulation blowers, fiberglass, and protective equipment, but when it was time for delicate, meticulous hands, Corey was there to remind him that he couldn’t just rip wires out of a wall like a tapeworm and start anew.
If only Corey knew how dire things really were, maybe he would better understand why Mason’s patience slipped from time to time.
“Whatever, bro. You don’t want to listen, it’s your funeral,” Corey finally said. He took two emphatic steps forward, then addressed the headstones like a drum major. “Where is our help? Where be our crew?”
“You mean Cassie? She’s six months pregnant, Core.”
“Yes! The fair lass, Cassie… What’s her maid’s name again?”
“Sylvia.”
Corey smiled. “Ah, yes! And the not-so-fair lass, Sylvia!”
“They’re meeting us in town once we finish up here. I wanted to be the first to give the place the once-over, to see just what we’ve got. The owner sent me a letter, for fuck’s sake. Who the hell sends a letter?
“Now, get over here―you need to hold the light while I map things out. Worst-case scenario on all this, if we can’t do it, at least we’ll have a place to sleep for a few weeks.”
Corey rolled his eyes. “Who’d want to live in the past? Nothing to find there.”
“It’s not like we have much of a choice, Core.”
Corey walked, stiff-legged, mockingly, to the truck and returned with a hand-held work light with a dinner-plate sized lens and a trigger. He stopped in front of both doors, which were wide enough to fit a car and heavy enough to flatten one. 
Suddenly, the sheer vastness of the building engulfed Mason’s thoughts. It had been surreal at first, merely a door to an opportunity. Now, though, who knew what it might lead to?
Stood beneath the shadow cast by the awning, Mason noticed the building had more windows than he’d previously thought and the finer details of their appearance stood out. They were cracked and broken, though the metal bars covering them were intact with the same burnt orange color as the fence surrounding the property. On the inside, black spray paint had been liberally dispensed in an effort to discourage looters.
But Mason also saw the layers in the paint chipping around the door handles. He saw the spiders that had made their home in the keyhole. He felt the swampish draft curling around the crack in the doors and the faint, sickly sweet smell of a dead animal, decaying in one of the asylum’s dilapidated rooms. Through it all, he placed his hand on the door and prayed―and couldn’t help wondering if his brother was doing the same.
Yep, there was no two ways about it. Daggermouth was a shithole.