Return to the Dark House

by Laurie Stolarz

  “Put it away. The sugar and carbs are on me this time—literally.” I sigh. “Straight to my ass and thighs.” I grab a handful of ketchup packets and syrup containers, and we take a seat by the windows.

  Ivy is way prettier than the couple of snapshots I saw of her online: straight dark hair, big brown eyes, razor-sharp cheekbones, and full pouted lips—looks that any horror film director would kill for. She takes a teabag out of her purse (?!) and dunks it into a cup of hot water.

  “And some people just carry breath mints,” I joke.

  “Want some?” she asks. “I have a whole tin.”

  “No thanks,” I say, nodding to my Diet Coke.

  We spend the next twenty minutes devouring our feast o’ fat and catching up on each other’s lives, pre–Dark House weekend.

  “So, when did you become interested in Justin Blake?” she asks.

  “Sometime around birth,” I joke. “I think my rattle was in the shape of the Nightmare Elf. But it wasn’t just JB’s work that I was so obsessed with. I used to love all types of horror. It was my dream to be a scream queen.”

  “A what queen?”

  “Scream queens. You know…women who star pretty exclusively in horror flicks. It’s a whole niche market, and it seemed perfectly suited to me—with my background in dancing, and all—because, let’s face it, I don’t exactly fit into the whole dancer-rexic mold.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Rexic. As in anorexic. The girls here are way too hungry, which in turn makes them bitchy and uptight. They just don’t get that dance isn’t solely for the huffy-stuffy stage. I mean, what about The Rocky Horror Picture Show? Repo: The Genetic Opera? Or Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead?”

  Ivy looks at me, her face funked up, as if I’m a chicken dead.

  “Opportunities for multitalented scream queens are ample,” I continue. “Not to mention that the pay is decent and the time commitment is way more manageable than mainstream film, theater, and TV, especially for those of us still in school. And, P.S., you don’t have to be some mega-whoa-superstar actor who began her career as a baby in Gerber commercials. But I don’t want to be a scream queen anymore, not even a dancing scream queen. That dream pretty much faded after I got here.”

  “Why? What happened?”

  I poke a syrup-drenched fry into my mouth, wishing I had another plateful. “It’s weird. My parents met in the service, both stationed overseas, both saw a lot of death. They always taught me survival of the fittest, that when you get knocked down you have to pick yourself up right after, and that it’s always the strongest who survive. And so, whenever anything hard hit, I’d immerse myself in theater and dance, becoming someone else, forgetting all the tough stuff, telling myself any story I wanted. But ‘survival of the fittest’ doesn’t exactly leave much room for heart. I mean, just look at where that mentality’s gotten me. I have no friends. I’ve gained twelve pounds. And don’t even get me started on my grades.”

  “Okay,” she says, clearly not following, and I can’t exactly blame her. I sound like a babbling buffoon.

  “In some way, coming to this campus…it’s been the worst couple of months of my life. But in another way, it’s given me perspective. I mean, how am I supposed to move forward when I haven’t dealt with my past?”

  “And so is that the reason you changed your mind about meeting? Because I’m a part of your past?”

  “Sort of ironic, isn’t it? I mean, since we never really met before now. The scary part? After the Dark House weekend, it never even dawned on me to deal with what happened. Plus, I got so distracted by my five minutes of fame. By the time I arrived on campus, I was the quintessential ‘it’ girl—the one who’d been on television and interviewed in newspapers and magazines, the girl who got away. But it wasn’t long before that five minutes of fame morphed into five degrees of shame. Now everybody just sees me as the girl who could’ve stopped everything but who royally blew it instead.”

  “And how do you see yourself?”

  “Lucky to be alive, I guess. But also questioning who I am. A coward who only cares about herself…? A girl who’s okay being noticed as the winner in a losing game?”

  “Or a survivor.”

  “Okay, but a survivor at what cost?” I gobble a few more fries. “Anyway. I used to research the horror movie market pretty hardcore, looking for opportunities to audition. That’s when I saw the Nightmare Elf’s contest. I thought it might be a nice stepping stone, getting to meet JB and all.”

  “Justin Blake?” Ivy asks, as if there’s any other JB.

  “Well, duh?” I roll my eyes.

  “And now for the million-dollar question.” She licks her syrupy finger. “Why didn’t you stick around to meet JB? What made you leave?”

  “The police didn’t tell you?” I ask, feeling the surprise on my face. “I found a body. In the basement.”

  Ivy’s fork drops to her plate with a clank and her eyes get saucer-big. The girl has serious star potential.

  “I’d cut my hand pretty bad,” I tell her. “And so I went downstairs to look for Midge, hoping she’d have a first aid kit. There was a freezer chest by the boiler tank. I opened it, looking for an ice pack. Instead I found a girl’s body.”

  “What girl?”

  “I don’t know.” I shrug. “The body was gone by the time the authorities got to the house, and the inside of the freezer had been torched—probably to destroy the DNA.”

  “I had no idea.” Her mouth gapes open. She reminds me a little bit of Barbara Steele from Black Sunday, one of the most notable horror movies ever.

  “Anyway, I gave the feds a full description of the body, but there hadn’t been any missing-girl reports fitting that description, so I’m not really sure where things stand on that front. I’m not even sure if the police believe that the body was real.”

  “But you’re sure it was?”

  “Definitely sure.” I nod. “I mean, I think it was. I’m almost positive, that is.” I let out a nervous giggle. “It’s just that there’s been so much bogusness surrounding this case. Right after that weekend, an anonymous someone thought it’d be funny to send me an invite to see the sequel.”

  “Do you still have it?”

  “Negative. I gave it to the police. But I do have a weird video link that I can show you,” I say, perking up. “I got it just today, actually—just a few minutes before you arrived. I didn’t get to watch the whole thing, but it looks super dullsville: a family, a diner, a waitress with Mohawk hair and vampy makeup.”

  “Can I see it?”

  “Sure,” I say, spotting my evil ex-roommate and her plastic pet Barbie at the potato bar. I’d give almost anything to cast them in a slasher movie, where they’d be the overnight campers, and I’d be the deranged ax-wielding counselor.

  Emily lets out a snort of a laugh when she sees me look.

  “Who’s that?” Ivy asks.

  “Emily, my old roommate, with Barbie, her new roommate, aka the leaning tower of Leesa. I really hope they get the fuzzy bacon bits.”

  “What makes her a leaning tower?”

  “Do you seriously need to ask?”

  Ivy takes a second look, her eyes zeroing in on Barbie’s double-D cups, made even more pronounced by the Betty Boop decal on the front of her top.

  “Barbie got those implants for her eighteenth birthday,” I say. “No joke. She tells everybody. I actually got to see them. One night, in our room, Barbie was like a cheesy five-dollar peepshow, answering questions about the procedure and whether or not her nipples still get perky. TMI?”

  “Just a little.”

  “Sorry.” I feign a cringe. “Then I’ll spare you the details about the bounce-touch-buoyancy test a couple of the girls gave her. Anyway, the real tragedy? No one told Barbie that ballerinas are pretty one-dimensional. Oh, and P.S., her real name is Leesa; not Barbara or Bernadette, or any other elongated version of the B-word.”

  “Really?” Ivy asks, her face finally
lightening up.

  Barbie turns toward us. The words “You Betty I’m Single” are printed below the Betty Boop decal, making us burst out laughing.

  A piece of chewed-up french fry shoots out Ivy’s mouth, landing against the window glass. “Oh my g—” she whines, unable to get the word out. A weird hiccupping sound croaks out her mouth.

  My eyes tear up. My stomach twinges. And that’s when I know for sure—that Ivy is my kind of cool, and that we’re destined to be close friends.

  BACK IN MY ROOM, I search my e-mail for the video link in question. “It was sent from a JB superfan—at least I assume it was a superfan, because he or she was claiming to be the Nightmare Elf.”

  Ivy pulls up a stool and sits thisclose for the optimal view of my computer screen, dust bunnies and all. “How do you know that the sender was only claiming to be the Nightmare Elf, and not the actual Nightmare Elf?”

  “For reals?” I shoot her a stupefied look. “Do you have any idea how many JB fanatics are out there posing as the Nightmare Elf?”

  “Eighty-two on YouTube. At least the last time I checked.”

  “Which was probably just this morning,” I say, only half-joking. Finally, I find the e-mail, sandwiched between offers for long-lasting love and millions of dollars in inheritance.

  “Holy crap,” she whispers. Her mouth drops open, her eyes widen with urgency, and her brows dart up. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she’d been a scream queen for years. “This link was sent to you in a Nightmare Elf e-newsletter,” she says.

  “And, once again, do you know how many supposed Nightmare Elf e-newsletters have been created since the Dark House weekend?”

  “No,” Ivy says, shaking her head. “I mean, the issue number…it’s 207, the next one in the sequence, following the e-newsletter I got last fall.”

  “I’m pretty sure the JB fanatics have all of that information covered. They may have a fetish for blood, spew, guts, and gore, but still they’re a pretty savvy bunch.”

  “No,” Ivy persists. “I got an e-newsletter recently too. But the issue number was 208—the one after this one.”

  “Meaning?” I ask, feeling my head start to fuzzify.

  Instead of answering, she takes the liberty of clicking on the video link. As the movie loads, she practically salivates. Her eyes fixed on the screen, she nibbles her lip and leans in closer.

  “Do you want a napkin?” I joke.

  She shakes her head, oblivious to my sarcasm. The video starts. A seemingly ordinary diner appears on the screen. It’s filled with seemingly ordinary people, eating less-than-appetizing food—a square block of gray something (meat?), a basket full of brown bread.

  “There’s no audio,” I say, as if it isn’t already obvious.

  It appears as if the video’s being shot from one particular corner, but then we move closer, focusing on the family—a husband, a wife, their perfectly pretty daughter. The daughter looks to be about twelve or thirteen, with long dark hair, held back with a bright pink headband.

  The mom in the video puts her arm around Daughter’s shoulder. Dad laughs at something Mom says. Daughter sticks her tongue out in retaliation at both of them.

  “Total Snoresville, right?” I ask.

  Apparently Ivy doesn’t think so. She cups her hand over her mouth.

  “What?” I insist. “Don’t tell me that this lame-ass, B-rated video holds the magical key to Oz.” I take another look, noticing that Daughter is wearing a pink shirt that matches her paisley headband, which coordinates with her pink and paisley wristlet. Way too tacky, but that can’t possibly be what’s got Ivy all upset.

  A few seconds later, the movie fades to black and Ivy stands up. She’s trembling. Her face is white. She looks like she’s about to hurl. “It’s him,” she whispers.

  “Whoa, wait, what’s him?”

  “I told them. I knew it.” She turns away, headed for the door.

  “Ivy—wait,” I call.

  She doesn’t listen. She doesn’t answer me. She simply grabs her bag and goes for the door.

  I RUN.

  I run faster than I’ve ever run before—as far as my legs will take me. Down a stairwell, through the lobby, across a parking lot, past a soccer field, and up at least a hundred tiny steps.

  Standing by a giant clock tower, I try to catch my breath, my lungs straining, my heart aching. A cold breeze brushes against my neck, sends chills down my spine.

  The campus is sprawled out beneath me. The lights are on in several of the buildings, and yet everything appears vacant.

  “Ivy?”

  I turn to look.

  It’s Taylor. She comes and stands beside me, wipes my tears with the sleeve of her sweatshirt, and then wraps her arms around my shoulders. She smells like maple syrup. “It’s going to be okay,” she tells me. “You’re safe here.”

  If only that were true. But things are not okay. And I’m not safe anywhere—not while the killer’s still out there, studying me, directing my every move. He knew that I’d eventually reach out to Taylor, and that we’d compare videos, just like he knew how to get me to enter the Nightmare Elf’s contest last year.

  Taylor pulls me closer, and I rest my head against her shoulder. I can’t stop shaking. My mind won’t stop reeling. Why can’t I remember what Mom, Dad, and I had been talking about at the diner that day? Or the reason that Dad laughed? Or what Mom said in response. The fact that I can’t remember those things widens the hole in my heart.

  “The campus is pretty at night, isn’t it?” Taylor asks. “All lit up. Sometimes when I feel like running away, I’ll come here and remind myself how lucky I am.”

  “Lucky because you got away?”

  “Lucky for a lot of things, I guess.”

  “I wish I felt lucky too, but sometimes I wish that I’d died right along with them.”

  She pulls away to look into my face. “Don’t talk like that. I mean, I know this’ll probably sound majorly cliché, but you have your whole life in front of you. Plus, it’s like you said before: maybe the others are still alive.”

  “I was talking about my parents. Sometimes I wish that I’d died right along with them seven years ago.”

  Her expression shows no surprise; she must’ve heard that my parents were murdered.

  “I’m going to find the killer,” I tell her.

  “Wait.” Her eyes slam shut. “Your parents’ killer? Or the Nightmare Elf killer?”

  “They’re one and the same.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The person who organized the Dark House weekend is the same person that killed my parents. No one can deny it anymore.”

  Taylor makes a confused face—her lip snarled, her nose scrunched.

  “I’m going to find him,” I say again. Ticktock, ticktock. The ticking of the clock tower vibrates inside my chest. Only instead of rattling my bones, it’s somewhat motivating, reminding me that time is of the essence and I have so much work to do.

  BACK IN TAYLOR’S ROOM, we sit in front of the computer. The video is paused. The air feels stifling. There’s a twisting sensation in my gut.

  “That’s me,” I say, nodding toward the screen.

  “Hold on, what’s you?”

  “The girl on the screen, at the diner. That was me,” I attempt to explain. “Seven years ago. Those were my parents—the ones who were murdered.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “I know it sounds crazy, bu—”

  “Are you sure?” She fast-forwards to a spot where the camera zooms in on me—where I’m resting my head on Mom’s shoulder. My face looks a lot thinner now. My cheekbones are sharper. My chin is more pointed. My hair is darker, straighter, longer. But still, my eyes are unmistakable—light brown, slightly angled, with somewhat droopy lids.

  “Holy shit,” Taylor says, looking back at me, studying my face.

  “I remember the day this video was taken,” I tell her. “I’d gone to a diner with my parents and we’d sat at that checker
board table. I remember playing checkers with the jam and peanut butter containers. My parents were murdered just a couple of days later.”

  “Holy shit,” she says again. “We need to show this to the police. I mean, do you seriously get what this means?”

  “That the killer’s been watching me for years.”

  “Exactly, which is, like, crazy town.”

  “It may be crazy, but it’s also what I’ve suspected all along. Even before the Dark House weekend, I’d be walking home from school or shopping in town somewhere and feel his eyes on me.”

  “And you didn’t tell anyone?”

  “Of course I told. My therapist knew. She thought I was being paranoid. She still does.”

  “Okay, so if this crazed killer has been watching you for years—and wants you to know it—why would he send the link to me? Why not send it to you? I mean, to me it’s pretty meaningless.”

  “Because he wanted us to meet. And he was willing to wait until we did—until the two of us got together and compared notes.”

  “But what if instead of sharing the link with you, I showed it to the police?”

  “You didn’t have time to show them, though, did you? Didn’t you say you got this link just before I got here?”

  “Minutes before.” She nods.

  I replay the video again, searching for a clue—some hidden message as to where the others might be. Unlike the video of Natalie, this one wasn’t uploaded by Movie Marvin. It was posted to Filmeo, a site where filmmakers showcase their works-in-progress—only this one hasn’t been made public. Words sit at the top of the screen: EXCLUSIVE VIEWING PERMISSION.

  “He posted this just for us,” I whisper, proceeding to fill her in about the video of Natalie.

  “And so obviously the videos were made by two different people,” she says.

  “Not obviously. The e-mail address is the same. The Nightmare Elf at Gmail.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nod. “In the video of Natalie, she was wearing a gold bracelet with a star charm…just like the necklace pendant I received years ago.”

  “Wait, what pendant?”