Crush

by Stefan Petrucha

  Jonathan ran toward the desk. Kirsty looked startled for a moment, but recovered quickly. She flashed out her hand and raked her fingernails down his face. The pain slowed Jonathan, but it wasn’t until she buried her knee in his crotch that he stopped.

  He dropped to his knees. Pain like he’d never known exploded through his body, radiating from between his legs with such ugly force, he thought he might vomit. His head blossomed with colors, each one representing a different level of agony. He slumped forward, clutching himself and gasping for breath.

  “Idiot,” Kirsty whispered. “You’ve ruined everything.”

  Jonathan groaned. His eyes were covered in greasy tears, blurring his vision, but he blinked the moisture away. Behind him he heard Kirsty walking to the other side of the room.

  “I loved you,” she said. “And this is how you treat me? I loved YOU!”

  He managed to roll over and see the girl standing in the far corner of the room. “You call this love?” Jonathan asked.

  “No,” Kirsty muttered. “I call this…over.”

  The Reapers appeared in the doorway then. They did not pause, but soared into the room. Three of them pushed through the door and unfolded to their full size. They danced in the air above him like circling manta rays, wearing grins on their transparent faces. One swooped down and grazed his aching body with its cold, wet form. Another repeated the move, only this one connected hard with Jonathan’s shoulder, sending him onto his back.

  The third one dropped to the floor. It crept over Jonathan’s head, leaving a moist trail on his hair and skin. He struggled, threw his hands up to pull the phantom off of him, but it was too strong. A moment later his nose and mouth were covered. He beat at it, tore at it with his fingernails, but the phantom was already lifting him off the floor.

  Through the film of the shadowy body, Jonathan watched his own hands flail as he rose off of the carpet. The picture of Kirsty, a rectangular blur, flapped in the air, still held firmly between his fingers. His chest heaved for breath, but the ghost’s form filled his nose, his mouth. His pulse thundered like drums in his ears. His heart beat like a speeding train, trying to break through his ribs. Up and up. The phantom lifted him from the floor and dragged him to the ceiling. Another of the Reapers wrapped around his legs.

  Together the two monsters carried him around the room. They beat him against the ceiling, then dropped to the floor, skimming over the carpet.

  Jonathan’s head grew light. His body began to hitch violently as his lungs struggled to draw breath. White flashes appeared in his vision, playing against the dark field covering his eyes.

  In a final attempt to save his own life, Jonathan threw out his hand, reached for anything he could get his fingers on. He was helpless in midair. If he could get on his feet, get some control of any kind…

  He felt wood scrape over his chest and arms. He was being lifted by his feet, dangling upside down. He desperately reached out, and the edge of the desk slid into his palm. He held on with all of his might.

  The phantoms continued to climb, and a searing agony flared at Jonathan’s shoulder. It felt like his arm would rip out of the socket. But he held on.

  Through the shade of the Reaper’s body, he saw the goblet on the desk’s surface. More lights flashed before his eyes, and his torso clenched miserably. He needed air. Needed it right now.

  A low ringing filled his ears. His eyes stung from the secretions on the surface of the ghost, but he could see the goblet. He saw his face looking up at him from it.

  Jonathan reached down. He dropped Kirsty’s picture in the cup. With his fingers freed of it, he yanked his picture from the foul liquid. He flung it to the floor, and suddenly the grip on his feet was gone and he was falling.

  The cowl lifted from his mouth, his nose, his eyes. Jonathan gasped, taking in gulps of sweet air, filling his desperate lungs with oxygen as his mind spun out of control like a broken carnival ride. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling, expecting to see the Reapers regrouping above him, but they didn’t appear.

  From the far corner of the room, Kirsty began to scream.

  But it only lasted for a few seconds before she fell silent.

  Jonathan looked in her direction.

  The Reapers covered her. They did not lift her from the carpet, the mistake they’d made with Jonathan. No. They covered her like a filmy cocoon, pinning her to the wall. Her face was a mask of terror. Mouth wide. Eyes pushed closed. Unmoving. Shaded darkly by the bodies of her phantoms.

  17

  Jonathan sat at Perky’s staring at the empty chair on the other side of the table. He stirred his coffee absently, looked out the window at the sun-drenched day. People walked along the mall, holding bags of clothes and electronics and toys and kitchenware. They all seemed so happy, so content with their places in the world.

  Jonathan wondered what that felt like. Maybe one day he’d know.

  “So, dude,” David said, dropping his butt into the empty chair. He set his cup of coffee on the table and leaned forward. “You want to run all of this by me again?”

  “What’s left to tell?” Jonathan asked. “Kirsty was “Yeah. Duh. Got that part of the story. Kirsty was freak salad. That’s all LAC—loud and clear. I just can’t quite deal with all of this yet.”

  “You and me both,” Jonathan said.

  “I just don’t know how to feel,” David said. “It’s like, I really liked her. Right? Then she turns out to be totally not what I thought, but I miss who I thought she was. It’s like missing a mask or something. Totally weird.”

  “WITE,” Jonathan said.

  “Huh?”

  “Weird in the extreme,” he explained.

  David smiled halfheartedly. He looked out the window and then turned from the glass.

  “Man,” David said. He shook his head and peered into his coffee cup. When he gazed up, he looked supremely serious. “I’m really sorry about everything that happened. I mean, everything with Kirsty. I was acting like a total tool.”

  “It wasn’t your fault. She manipulated us both.”

  Jonathan left it at that. What he knew—and what he didn’t want David to know—was that Kirsty only used David to get closer to Jonathan. She knew he wasn’t interested in her, not at first. But by turning Jonathan against David, making him think his friend was a killer, they would come together against him. And that’s what happened…at least for a while. Kirsty wanted Jonathan isolated, alone. She could have just killed David, but that wouldn’t have brought her any closer to Jonathan. If anything, it would have driven him farther away. No. She needed David as a scapegoat, needed to use him and hurt him. She probably would have killed him if Jonathan hadn’t stopped her.

  Another good reason for Jonathan to feel nothing but relief that she was gone.

  “So, what happens now?” David asked.

  “Now?” Jonathan asked. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, are you all magical like she thought or what?”

  Jonathan laughed and lifted his coffee for a sip. He let the liquid sit on his tongue and shook his head. “No. I’m not all magical. The only reason those things went after her instead of me is because I dropped her picture in the goblet when I was trying to take mine out. She worked the magic. I just got lucky.”

  “Damn,” David said. “But like, have you tried anything? Like a spell? I mean, did you find her stash of sorceress gear? Did she have books wrapped in human skin?”

  “I only found one book,” Jonathan said. “It was her diary. Weird-ass stuff.”

  “Like what?”

  “She called herself Adrian. It was a name she liked. She hated being called Kirsty. She was going through this great transformation, and when she finished she was going to emerge as Adrian. It was like a slam against her father, because he hated the name. Adrian was his sister’s name, and she was a full-on whack job.”

  “But didn’t she already kill her father?”

  “Like you said, freak salad.”


  “Did you keep it?”

  “The diary?” Jonathan asked. “Hell no. I mean, it connected her to the murders. She had these entries with the names of everyone that died. You’ve seen the news. The cops know she was involved. They may not believe she actually had ghosts killing people, but they know she was responsible.”

  “They haven’t talked to you at all?”

  “Yeah, they did,” Jonathan said. “But it was just to see if I was alive. They found my name in her diary and my picture at her house, but I think they’re done with me. No one saw me at her place except you. They probably have my fingerprints, but what are they going to check them against?”

  “So it’s over?”

  “Yeah, David. It’s over.”

  Life could go on. And it seemed to be getting better. Emma was out of the hospital now. Jonathan called her, totally surprising himself with the gesture. It was nice to hear her sounding so awake and happy. She didn’t remember a thing about what happened to her in the library stairwell, and Jonathan figured that was for the best. Emma didn’t sound particularly upset at all. She called herself a klutz and laughed. They chatted for over an hour. Before hanging up, she promised to buy him that coffee next Monday after school.

  “Are you sure you aren’t magical?” David asked.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know, you look different,” his friend said. “You look bigger or something.”

  Jonathan laughed and drank his coffee. “I’m not magical.”

  But, of course, that was a lie. He’d found a second journal in Kirsty’s room. In it were a dozen spells. They were generally very simple. A few ingredients for potions, a few rituals, a few words to speak. Jonathan had spent the last week toying with them, always surprised when they worked. And there was so much more to learn.

  Kirsty may not have had many books on magic, but they were out there. Lots of them.

  He made a mental note to stop the body-transformation spell for a couple of weeks. He didn’t want to draw attention to himself.

  “No magic here,” Jonathan said. “You’ll just have to deal with me the way I am.”

  EPILOGUE

  As the last words of the tale passed out of her mouth, Daphne staggered slightly, closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. It was always draining to be a vehicle for the bone stories, but she never really remembered what it felt like until it happened again, so there was no way to brace herself.

  Each time the possibility of freedom was so electrifying, and the story, no matter how horrible, so engrossing, it was easy to lose yourself in it, confuse yourself with the characters, even if they weren’t you. For a while, Daphne had even wondered if she was somehow Kirsty, before realizing what a monster the girl had become.

  She kept her eyes closed a while, to get her bearings, but she could hear the others talking. They all felt distant, as if they were in the next room and not right beside her.

  “A happy ending for a change,” Shirley’s high-pitched voice intoned.

  “Unless you’re one of the dead,” Anne muttered back.

  Daphne wanted to say something witty in response, but bits of the story clung doggedly to her mind. Why? She always wondered why certain stories appeared to each of them. Even if it wasn’t theirs, could they still mean something? Were they reminders? Clues? Warnings?

  Still feeling secluded in her own head, she opened her eyes to see Shirley shrug and nervously pick at one fingernail with another. “Well, I didn’t really like anyone who was killed, did you? In a way, that makes it okay that they died.”

  “Fun, even,” Anne offered.

  Mary looked at them both with disapproval. “I never thought of anyone’s pain as enjoyable. Enlightening perhaps, justifiable certainly, but not amusing.”

  Daphne could barely pay attention. What was that story really about? she wondered. A struggle for power? Not knowing who your friends are? Betrayals?

  “Gotta get your kicks where you can,” Anne said, but her voice was strained and her eyes kept darting about. “Every rat for himself, and God against everyone.”

  Isn’t that what we’re going through with Anne?

  Mary threw her hands out in annoyance. “How can you ever hope to remember who you are if you fail to distinguish yourself from beasts? If we’re, as you insist, all animals, what difference could it make what our lives were like? Doesn’t the mere existence of the bones say different?”

  “Just because we’re all animals doesn’t mean we’re the same animal,” Anne shot back, but her voice was weak, detached, and Daphne found herself staring.

  There’s something about you tonight. Something different.

  “Funny,” Shirley said. “Sometimes I wonder if we never really had an identity and we’re just really looking for a story we like enough to make our own.”

  Anne looked like she was going to respond, but then her eyes flashed back to the door.

  Is that it? Was the story trying to warn us about you, Anne?

  As if in answer taps came from the hall. Simultaneously, they turned toward the sound.

  Shirley’s hand went up to her throat. “It couldn’t be her, not again.”

  Mary shook her head and smiled reassuringly, “Hush. It’s not nearly loud enough for our hellish guardian. Probably just some real animals, as usual. More rats.”

  Anne leaned back against the counter, put her hands on the edge, pushed herself up, and sat right next to the bones. “Yeah, we’re fine,” she said, her voice again trailing off.

  No sooner did she get there than she raised her T-shirt from the side and slowly put the hem down atop the bones, covering them. As Daphne saw this, she felt her dread, the story, and the moment all come crashing together.

  That’s it, then.

  “Anne, what are you doing?” Daphne said softly, almost in a whisper.

  Mary and Shirley started to turn, to see what Daphne was talking about. But it didn’t matter, because just then the thick oak door to the kitchen slammed inward. The force pushing it was great enough to crack the door down the middle. The sound that accompanied it was so harsh, all four girls felt as if their chests had been split open.

  Framed in the open doorway, a thick gray mist coiled and writhed. It moved in, around, and over itself, swirling like a hundred ethereal cobras trying to hypnotize their prey. At the center of the maelstrom a thing like a mouth formed, just long enough to utter three short words:

  “How…dare…you…”

  Daphne was so terrified, she was barely able to turn from the manifesting Headmistress. She had to try to figure out how to hide the bones and escape. Still turning as the temperature rapidly dropped, she caught a glimpse of Mary and Shirley, both paralyzed with fear.

  But Anne, Anne was gone—and so were the bones.

  With a rush of frigid, fetid air, the mist in the doorway flooded the kitchen. As it came for them, the three wraiths tried to scatter, each screaming:

  “No! We’re sorry! Please!”

  “Quiet, Shirley! Just run!”

  “Where’s Anne? Where did she take the…”

  Dark tendrils lashed out, faster than Daphne’s last coherent thought:

  Anne stole the bones. She knew the Headmistress was coming and she stole the bones.

  The sound of their voices, the scraping of their movements, all went silent at the same moment. Atop the stove the rat watched the violent struggle of light and dark. It saw long tentacles of churning smoke snap themselves across the pretty mouths of the three girls, while others twisted their delicate hands and bound their lovely legs.

  And then the mass of smoke and spirits disappeared, like a fading shadow, through the doorway. The cracked door slammed shut. For a while, the echo of the thud was the only sound. Briefly it crashed about the kitchen, bouncing between the steel cabinets and tile walls, weaker and weaker as it went.

  When the reverberations finally faded, the rat finished nibbling the bit of grit in its claws. The noise was terrifying, and the rat had
feared the other creatures that were here might be after its food, the way its fellow rats always were. Once satisfied that the room was quiet again, it set about looking for more. When it found the next big gob of rotted, crusty grease, it let into it with gusto, comforted by the fact that tonight at least, it wouldn’t have to share with anyone.

  TO BE CONTINUED

  About the Authors

  STEFAN PETRUCHA was minding his own business writing many books, including TEEN, INC., THE SHADOW OF FRANKENSTEIN, and the award-winning Nancy Drew graphic novels, when a mysterious force entered his car in New York City and started talking about horror stories. Wicked Dead is the result. He has since moved to Amherst, Massachusetts.

  THOMAS PENDLETON is a mysterious force with many names. All we know for sure is that under another name he is a critically acclaimed and award-winning horror author. He lives in Austin, Texas. We were afraid to ask him anything else.

  You can visit them online at www.wickeddead.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

  Credits

  Cover art © 2008 by Chad Michael Ward

  Cover design by Christopher Stengel

  Copyright

  WICKED DEAD: CRUSH. Copyright © 2008 by Stefan Petrucha and Thomas Pendleton. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.