“Right. Thanks.”
As soon as Jeff disappeared into the kitchen, Oswald ran to the back corner and dove into the pit.
The familiar musty smell filled his nose as he sank beneath the surface. He sat on the pit’s floor. He counted to one hundred as he always did, even though he wasn’t sure it served any purpose in getting him to make the jump to Freddy Fazbear’s in 1985. He shifted on the pit’s floor and felt something solid press against his lower back.
A shoe. It felt like the sole of a shoe. He scooted around and grabbed it. It was a boot, a steel-toed work boot like his dad used to wear to work at the mill and now wore to his job at the Snack Space. He moved his hand up a little. An ankle! An ankle in the kind of thick boot sock his dad liked. He crawled farther across the floor of the pit. The face. He had to feel the face. If it was some giant furry head like the yellow thing’s, he might never stop screaming. But he had to find out.
His hand found a shoulder. He reached to the chest and felt the cheap fabric of a white undershirt. He was shaking as he reached higher. He felt an unmistakably human face. Skin and stubble. A man’s face. Was it Dad, and was he—
He had to be alive. He had to be.
Oswald had seen shows where people who had been in emergency situations suddenly developed amazing strength and found themselves able to lift the front end of a car or tractor. This was the kind of strength Oswald needed to find. His dad wasn’t a big man, but he was still a man and weighed at least twice as much as his son. He had to move his dad if he was going to save him.
If this even was his dad. If this wasn’t some kind of cruel hoax set up by the yellow thing to trap him. Oswald couldn’t let himself think these thoughts, not if he was going to do what he had to do.
He got behind the person, grabbed under his armpits, and pulled. Nothing happened. Dead weight, Oswald thought. No, not dead, please … not dead.
He pulled again, this time with more force, making a noise that was somewhere between a grunt and a roar. This time, the body moved, and Oswald pulled again, standing up and getting the person’s head and shoulders above the surface. It was his dad, pale and unconscious, but breathing, definitely breathing, and around them, not Freddy Fazbear’s in 1985, but the normal, present-day weirdness of Jeff’s Pizza.
How could Oswald get him out? He could call Mom. As a nurse, she would know what to do. But what if she thought he was crazy or lying? He felt like the Boy Who Cried Wolf. Or the Boy Who Cried Rabbit.
He felt it before he saw it. The presence behind him, the awareness of something in his personal space. Before he could turn around, a pair of furry yellow arms locked around him in a fearsome embrace.
He got his right arm free enough to jab his elbow into the yellow thing’s midsection. He got loose, but the thing was blocking the exit to the pit. He couldn’t get out of the pit by himself, let alone with his poor, passed-out dad.
Acting more than thinking, Oswald charged at the rabbit with his head down. If he could just throw it off balance or knock it under the surface, maybe he could make it end up in 1985 Freddy Fazbear’s and buy Oswald and his dad some time to escape.
He head-butted the yellow thing and knocked it into the ropes and netting that surrounded the ball pit. It stumbled a little, righted itself, and then, arms outstretched, lunged toward Oswald. It pushed Oswald against the wall of the pit. Its eyes dead as always, it unhinged its jaws to reveal double rows of fangs as sharp as scimitars. Mouth open freakishly wide, it lunged for Oswald’s throat, but he blocked it with his arm.
Pain pierced Oswald’s forearm as the yellow thing sank its fangs into his skin.
Oswald used his good arm to punch the rabbit hard in the face before the fangs pierced too deeply. Fangs. What kind of crazy rabbit had fangs?
The thing’s jaws released their grip, but there was no time to survey the damage because the thing was lurching toward Oswald’s dad, its jaws wide open, like a snake about to swallow its unsuspecting prey.
Its fangs were red with Oswald’s blood.
Oswald elbowed the yellow thing aside and moved between it and his still-unconscious father. “You leave … my dad … ALONE!” he yelled, then used the netting to bounce off and clamber onto the yellow thing’s back. He hit its head with his fists, scratched at its eyes, which didn’t feel like a living creature’s eyes. The rabbit stumbled back into the netting and ropes, then grabbed Oswald’s arms and slung him hard off its shoulders and into the pit.
Oswald fell headfirst under the surface, grateful that the bottom of the pit was soft. His arm was throbbing, his whole body was exhausted, but he had to get up. He had to save his dad. Like those ancient Greek heroes Gabrielle had told him about, he had to be brave and face the monster.
Oswald rose unsteadily to his feet.
Somehow, when it shook Oswald off, the yellow thing must have gotten tangled in the ropes and netting that lined the ball pit. A rope was looped around its neck, and it grasped the rope with its big paws, trying to get free. Oswald couldn’t understand why it was failing to free itself until he saw that the yellow thing’s feet weren’t touching the floor of the pit. The yellow thing was suspended from the rope, which was tied securely to a metal rod at the top of the ball pit.
The rabbit had hanged itself. Its mouth was opening and closing like it was gasping for breath, but no sound came out. Its paws clawed desperately at the ropes. Its stare, still terrifying in its blankness, was aimed in Oswald’s direction, as if it were asking him for help.
Oswald certainly wasn’t going to rescue it.
After a few more seconds of struggling, the yellow thing was still. Oswald blinked. Hanging from the rope was nothing but a dirty, empty yellow rabbit costume.
His dad’s eyes opened. Oswald rushed to his side.
“I don’t understand why I’m here,” Dad said. His face was pale and unshaven, his eyes puffy with dark half-moons under them. “What happened?”
Oswald debated what to say: You were attacked and left for dead by a giant evil rabbit who tried to replace you, and I was the only person who could see it wasn’t you. Even Mom thought it was you.
No. It sounded too crazy, and Oswald didn’t relish the idea of spending years in therapy saying, But the evil rabbit WAS real.
Jinx was the only other member of the family who knew the truth, and being a cat, she wasn’t going to say anything in his defense.
Besides, his dad had already suffered enough.
Oswald knew it was wrong to lie. He also knew that lying was not a skill he had. When he tried, he always got all nervous and sweaty and said “uh” a lot. But in this situation, a lie might be the only way forward. He took a deep breath.
“So, uh … I hid in the ball pit to play a prank on you, which I shouldn’t have done. You came to look for me, and I guess you must’ve hit your head and lost consciousness.” Oswald took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean for things to get so out of hand.”
This part, at least, was the truth.
“I accept your apology, son,” Dad said. He didn’t sound mad, just tired. “But you’re right—you shouldn’t have done it. And Jeff really should get rid of this ball pit before he has a lawsuit on his hands.”
“Definitely,” Oswald said. He knew he would never set foot in the pit again. He would miss Chip and Mike, but he needed to make some friends in his own time. His mind flashed to the girl on the bench at recess. Gabrielle. She seemed nice. Smart, too. They had had a good talk.
Oswald reached for his dad’s hand. “Let me help you stand up.”
With Oswald steadying him, Dad rose to his feet and let his son lead him to the exit of the ball pit. He paused to look up at the hanging yellow costume. “What is that creepy thing?”
“I have no idea,” said Oswald.
This, too, was the truth.
They climbed out of the pit and walked through Jeff’s Pizza. Jeff was wiping the counter, still watching the ball game on the restaurant’s TV. Had he not seen or heard
anything?
Still holding Oswald’s hand—when was the last time he and his dad had held hands?—Dad lifted his son’s arm and looked at it. “You’re bleeding.”
“Yeah,” Oswald said, “I must’ve scraped my arm when I was trying to pull you out of the pit.”
His dad shook his head. “Like I said, that thing is a public safety issue. Just sticking up a sign saying KEEP OUT isn’t enough.” He let go of Oswald’s arm. “We’ll get your arm cleaned up at the house, and then your mom can dress the wound once she gets home from work.”
Oswald wondered what his mom would say when she saw the fang marks.
As they approached the front door, Oswald said, “Dad, I know I can be a pain sometimes, but I really do love you, you know.”
Dad looked at him with an expression that seemed both pleased and surprised. “Same here, kiddo.” He ruffled Oswald’s hair. “But you do have terrible taste in science-fiction movies.”
“Oh, yeah?” Oswald said, smiling. “Well, you have terrible taste in music. And you like boring ice cream.”
Together, they opened the door into the fresh night air.
Behind them, Jeff called, “Hey, kid! You forgot your soda!”
Flat and fat. Those were the two words that Sarah thought of when she looked in the mirror. Which she did a lot.
How could somebody with such a curved belly be as flat as an ironing board everywhere else? Other girls could describe their shapes as being like an hourglass or a pear. Sarah was shaped like a potato. Looking at her bulbous nose, her prominent ears, and how all her parts seemed stuck onto her body at random, she was reminded of the Mrs. Mix-and-Match doll she had as a kid. The one with different eyes, ears, noses, mouths, and other body parts you could stick on her to make her look as hilarious as you wanted. And so that was the nickname she came up with for herself: Mrs. Mix-and-Match.
But at least Mrs. Mix-and-Match had Mr. Mix-and- Match. Unlike the girls at school whom she called the Beautifuls, Sarah didn’t have a boyfriend or any prospect of one. Sure, there was one boy she looked at, dreamed of, but she knew he wasn’t looking at or dreaming of her. She guessed that she, like Mrs. Mix-and-Match in her single days, would just have to wait around until some equally unfortunate-looking guy came along.
But in the meantime, she needed to finish getting ready for school.
Still looking at her worst enemy, the mirror, she applied some mascara and pink-tinted lip balm. For her birthday, her mom had finally given her permission to wear a little light makeup. She gave her dull, mousy brown hair a thorough brushing. She sighed. It was as good as it was going to get. And it wasn’t good.
The walls of Sarah’s room were decorated with photos of models and pop stars she had cut out of magazines. Their eyes were smoky, their lips full, their legs long. They were slender, curvy and confident, young but womanly, and their perfect bodies were wearing clothes Sarah couldn’t even dream of affording. Sometimes when she was getting ready in the morning, she felt as if these goddesses of beauty were looking at her with disappointment. Oh, they seemed to say, is THAT what you’re wearing? Or, No hope of a modeling career for you, sweetheart. Still, she liked having the goddesses there. If she couldn’t see beauty when she looked in the mirror, at least she could see it when she looked at the walls.
In the kitchen, her mom was dressed for work in a long floral print dress, her salt-and-pepper hair long and loose down her back. Her mom never wore makeup or did anything special with her hair, and she had a tendency to put on weight around her hips. Still, Sarah had to admit that her mom had a natural prettiness she herself lacked. Maybe it skips a generation, Sarah thought.
“Hey, cupcake,” Mom said. “I picked up some bagels. I got that kind you like with all the seeds. You want me to pop one in the toaster for you?”
“No, I’ll just have a yogurt,” Sarah said, though her mouth watered at the thought of a toasty Everything bagel slathered in cream cheese. “I don’t need all those carbs.”
Mom rolled her eyes. “Sarah, those little yogurt cups you live on have just ninety calories in them. It’s a wonder you don’t pass out from hunger in school.” She took a big bite of the bagel she had fixed for herself. She had put the top and bottom together sandwich-style, and cream cheese squished out when she chomped it. “Besides,” Mom said, her mouth full, “you’re much too young to be worried about carbs.”
And you’re much too old not to be worried about them, Sarah wanted to say, but she stopped herself. Instead, she said, “A yogurt and a bottle of water will be plenty to hold me over until lunchtime.”
“Suit yourself,” Mom said. “But I’m telling you, this bagel is delicious.”
* * *
Unlike most mornings, Sarah actually made it to the school bus in time, so she didn’t have to walk. She sat by herself and watched YouTube makeup tutorials on her phone. Maybe on her next birthday Mom would let her wear more than mascara and BB cream and tinted lip balm. She could get what she needed to do some real contouring, to make her cheekbones look more pronounced and her nose less bulbous. Getting her brows done professionally would also really help. Right now she and her tweezers were fighting a daily battle against a unibrow.
Before first period, as she got her science book out of her locker, she saw them. They strutted down the hall like supermodels doing a runway show, and everybody—everybody—stopped what they were doing to watch them. Lydia, Jillian, Tabitha, and Emma. They were cheerleaders. They were royalty. They were stars. They were who every girl in the school wanted to be and who every boy in the school wanted to be with.
They were the Beautifuls.
Each girl had her own particular brand of beauty. Lydia had blonde hair and blue eyes and a rosy complexion, while Jillian had fiery red hair and catlike green eyes. Tabitha was dark with chocolate-brown eyes and lustrous black hair, and Emma had chestnut hair and enormous doe-like brown eyes. All the girls had long hair—the better to flip luxuriously over their shoulders—and were slender but with enough curves to fill out their clothes in the bust and the hips.
And their clothes!
Their clothes were as beautiful as they were, all bought at high-end stores in big cities they visited on their vacations. Today they were all wearing black and white—a short black dress with a white collar and cuffs for Lydia, a white shirt with a black-and-white polka-dot miniskirt for Jillian, a black-and-white striped—
“What are they, penguins?” A voice cut off Sarah’s admiring thoughts.
“Huh?” Sarah turned to see Abby, her best friend since kindergarten, standing beside her. She was wearing some kind of hideous poncho and a long, loose floral-print skirt. She looked like she should be running a fortune-telling booth at the school carnival.
“I said they look like penguins,” Abby said. “Let’s hope there aren’t any hungry seals around.” She made a loud barking sound, then laughed.
“You’re crazy,” Sarah said. “I think they look perfect.”
“You always do,” Abby said. She was hugging her social studies book against her chest. “And I have a theory about why.”
“You have a theory about everything,” Sarah said. It was true. Abby wanted to be a scientist, and all those theories would probably come in handy one day when she was working on her PhD.
“You know how we used to play Barbies when we were little?” Abby asked.
When they were little, Sarah and Abby had each had pink carrying cases filled with Barbies and their various clothes and accessories. They had taken turns carrying their cases to each other’s houses and had played for hours, stopping only for juice box and graham cracker breaks. Life had been so easy back then.
“Yeah,” Sarah said. It was funny. Abby hadn’t changed much since those days. She still wore her hair in the same braids, still wore gold wire-framed glasses. The braces on her teeth and a few inches of height were the only differences. Still, when Sarah looked at Abby, she could at least see that the opportunity for beauty was there. Abby had a
flawless coffee-with-cream complexion and startling hazel eyes behind those glasses of hers. She took dance classes after school and had a graceful, slender body, even if she hid it under hideous ponchos and other baggy clothes. Sarah had no beauty, and it tormented her. Abby had beauty, but didn’t care about it enough to notice.
“My theory,” Abby said, getting animated the way she did when she was lecturing, “is that you used to love to play with Barbies, but now that you’re too old for them you need a Barbie substitute. Those empty-headed fashionistas are your Barbie substitute. That’s why you want to play with them.”
Play? Sometimes it was like Abby was still a little kid.
“I don’t want to play with them,” Sarah said, though she wasn’t sure this was exactly true. “I’m too old to want to play with anybody. I just … admire them, is all.”
Abby rolled her eyes. “What is there to admire? The fact that they can match their eye shadows to their outfits? If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go on admiring Marie Curie and Rosa Parks.”
Sarah smiled. Abby had always been such a nerd. A lovable nerd, but still, a nerd. “Well, you’ve never had much interest in fashion. I remember how you used to treat your Barbies.”
Abby grinned back. “Well, there was the one I shaved bald. And then there was the one with the hair I colored green with a Magic Marker so she looked like some kind of crazy supervillain.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “Now if those teen queens would let me play with them that way, I might be interested.”
Sarah laughed. “You’re the one who’s a supervillain.”
“Nope,” Abby said, “just a smart aleck. Which is why I’m way more fun than those cheerleaders.” Abby gave a little wave and then hurried off to class.
At lunch Sarah sat across from Abby. It was Friday, which was pizza day, and on Abby’s tray was one of the school’s rectangular pizza slices, a cup of fruit cocktail, and a carton of milk. School pizza wasn’t the best, but it was still pizza so it was pretty good. Too many carbs, though. Sarah had hit the salad bar instead and had gotten a green salad with low-fat vinaigrette dressing. She liked ranch a lot better than vinaigrette, but ranch added too many calories.
Into the Pit Page 5
