by Wesley King
PUFFIN
an imprint of Penguin Canada Books Inc., a Penguin Random House Company
Published by the Penguin Group
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Copyright © 2017 by Wesley King
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
Cover design: Lisa Jager
Cover image: (trees) Yuriy2012 / shutterstock.com; (letters) Vera Holera / shutterstock.com
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
King, Wesley, author
Laura monster crusher / Wesley King.
Issued in print and electronic formats
ISBN 9780670070022 (hardcover).—ISBN 9780143197829 (epub)
I. Title.
PS8621.I5653L39 2016 jC813’.6 C2016-900947-5
C2016-900948-3
Visit the Penguin Canada website at www.penguinrandomhouse.ca
v4.1
a
For my Opa,
whose memory remains in all that he built
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Acknowledgements
Chapter One
Duck, Duck, Goose ruined my life.
It happened way back in first grade, but I still remember it perfectly. I was wearing my favourite knitted red sweater and these really awful matching scarlet track pants—not sure why that outfit was allowed by my parents—the combination made me look like a particularly large and plump strawberry.
Our usually strict teacher, Mr. Bugbutter, surprised us with the news that we were going to play a quick game of Duck, Duck, Goose before home time, and the class happily marched down to the gym with me at the lead. I loved Duck, Duck, Goose more than anyone. Well…I did. That was about to change.
We sat in a circle, and I tucked myself in between Teresa Little and a really shy kid with a super freckly nose named Daniel Pittwell. Portia Carson was selected to go first. She stood up slowly, scanning the group for the perfect target. I saw her eyes dart from one face to the next like a predatory lioness. I watched her circle the group, tapping one nervous person after another with an almost whispered “duck,” and then, as she passed out of view behind me, I tensed, ready to move. I already knew what was coming. She slapped me on the head with those dainty, little, manicured fingers and shouted, “Goose!” The game was on.
I scrambled to my feet and took off around the left flank. You’re always at a disadvantage as the goose, of course; the picker is up and running. But I had a strategy. Take the inside track—force the picker wide. It gained you valuable seconds.
The plan worked perfectly. Portia Carson had to go around me, and I grinned wolfishly as I rounded the circle at a full sprint. I had a slight lead. The game was mine.
I think Mr. Bugbutter saw it coming first. I saw him look at me and then at Daniel Pittwell, who was sitting beside the now vacant spot in the circle. Mr. Bugbutter’s big brown eyes widened, his mouth opening with a desperate warning, but he was too late.
With a last burst of energy, I flung myself toward the opening—butt first.
I don’t know what happened. Maybe I was too competitive. Maybe I slightly miscalculated my jump. But whatever the reason, I over-sailed the opening and landed directly on poor, innocent Daniel Pittwell.
I should probably mention that I was the biggest girl in class. Actually I was the biggest kid in my grade. I was at least four inches taller than Daniel and probably thirty pounds heavier. He never had a chance. I heard a loud crack in his arm, Daniel started to scream—he was flattened beneath me on the floor at this point—and there I was, sitting on his stomach and looking around at a circle of horrified faces.
For years, they called it the Strawberry Squish. And the Dead Duck Disaster. There were a lot of names. But most importantly, that was the day they all realized something they would never again forget: Laura Ledwick was very large.
And worse yet, they never let me forget it either.
—
Six years later I left Newcastle Elementary for the last time, basically skipping down the hallways to the tune of the final bell. My family was moving to the next town over, Riverfield, in late August, and I would spend eighth grade at a new school. My dad had found his dream fixer-upper there, and we were making the short move to undertake the new project. My uncle Laine already lived in Riverfield with my aunt Sandra and their two kids, and he had recommended the place to my dad as a promising opportunity. I still hadn’t even seen it.
Most kids probably would be at least a little upset to be moving so suddenly, but I was thrilled. Portia Carson had naturally evolved into some sort of evil Barbie Doll, and she’d led her minions in a six-year campaign to remind me that I was fat. I’d had many names myself over those six years: Laura Largebottom, Laura Lardo, Laura Lumpy…you get the idea. Alliteration is always popular with bullies. Easier to remember, I guess.
Like I said, I was happy to leave Newcastle behind, although I knew that I was going to miss our house. I had this pale-yellow room with bright-pink unicorn border that hadn’t been changed since I was a baby. I know that sounds completely awful, but it felt like home. The bedroom was really small though: I couldn’t even fit a desk in there, and considering I loved to write and draw, that was a big issue. I had to use the floor, or sometimes the window, which probably confused my neighbours and didn’t help my reputation of being the reclusive, chubby girl who almost killed an innocent first grader.
To make matters worse, one of my aunts—my mom’s mean older sister Tara—also liked to refer to me as the Closet Monster when she came over and saw my tiny little bedroom. Not overly nice, considering I clearly had
weight and self-image issues, but it was kind of true.
Overall, my years at Newcastle Elementary were long and painful and mostly unpleasant. I had hobbies to keep my mind off of things: writing, drawing, working on the house with my dad, and softball. Ugh, never mind the last one. But when I saw other kids laughing with friends and playing in the schoolyard, I would get jealous. And upset. No one wanted to make friends with Laura Largebottom and no one wanted to become a new target of Portia Carson. So I was alone.
Even the town was bad, to be honest. Newcastle looked like an evil fantasy kingdom: ominous black smoke clouds would drift out of the old car plant down by the lake, blocking out the sun, sticking to windows and clothes, and generally making everything smell like burning rubber. I felt like I was living in Mordor. Combined with my super-bully Portia Carson, I was definitely ready to start somewhere new.
And then we pulled into the driveway of our new house.
“You have to be kidding me,” I said.
Chapter Two
The house was perched at the end of a sleepy little dead-end street that was appropriately named Raven’s End. There were only six old-fashioned brick houses on the street, all backing onto a dense forest that wrapped around the entire town. My parents had bought the house at the beginning of summer and insisted that it be a surprise for my brother and me on our first day—September 1st, only two days before the start of school. Now I could see why: they wanted to make sure someone was already living in our old house so we couldn’t run back to it and refuse to ever leave. Clearly Uncle Laine hadn’t actually looked at the house before he recommended it.
“Seriously, this isn’t the house, right?” I said.
The house was awful. The exterior was painted white, but the paint was peeling off everywhere and flying into the wind like artificial snowflakes. The steep roof was a patchwork of missing black shingles and exposed wood, while a large, rotting porch wrapped around the front of the house. The windows were worse. They were dark and grimy and one of them was even covered with a piece of plywood. Then you had the sprawling front lawn, which was at least a foot high and spotted with menacing thistles.
I was literally looking at a horror movie.
“Surprise,” my dad said happily.
My dad is a big man with a bit of a gut and a thick brown moustache. I like to call him Stache. His wispy chestnut hair is thinning and he’s almost fifty, but he’s got crazy amounts of energy. He’s the one who likes renovations. This was his big dream. A fixer-upper.
I guess my mom was equally to blame. She didn’t really like Newcastle either and quickly jumped on board when my dad suggested the move. She got in a fight with this woman on the parent council and decided she hated Newcastle. When she gets in a fight with someone, it lasts for like twenty-five years, so we didn’t have much choice.
She is an aesthetician, so she does people’s nails and waxing and things like that. My dad is an accountant, and he would still be commuting to the same job in the city, but he had the week off so he could try to get as much done around the house as possible. He likes to consider himself a handyman and always does everything himself.
“Is it bad?” my little brother asked.
I should probably tell you about my brother. His name is Tom, and he’s nine years old with sandy-blond hair and these really cool icy-blue eyes. He’s also blind. Not completely. He sees sort of different shades of black. Shapes sometimes. I’m way overprotective of him, but we have kind of a weird relationship where we just say things that should be faux pas. Like I call him Bat Boy and he calls me Giant Girl.
“It’s bad,” I said. “It looks like our old house, except condemned and haunted.”
“Oh,” he replied.
“It’s not that bad,” my mom said, giving me a disapproving look. “You should see the floor space. It’s twice the size of our old house.”
I made a face. “And eight times as decrepit.”
My father rubbed his big, calloused hands together eagerly. “Not for long,” he said. “I’ll have this place looking like a dream in no time flat. You just wait.”
I looked up at the ugly two-storey house looming over our car.
“Good luck, Stache.”
—
My bedroom was worse. First of all, I had to walk up the narrow old staircase with floorboards that groaned and complained like an African bull elephant was trying to climb the steps. I could see this house was going to be great for my confidence.
“Just needs to be nailed down,” my dad said, coming up the stairs behind me and noticing my sour expression.
“Or burned down,” I muttered.
Then I opened the door to my room. I’ve never seen so many spiderwebs. They looked like drapes. I would have needed a machete to get in there.
“No,” I said firmly, turning to my dad.
I hate spiders. Hate them. I’m not a girly girl by any stretch—I think I wore a dress once when I was six, and that was for a wedding. But spiders are my weakness.
Stache peered into the room for a moment. “I’ll clean yours first.”
When my dad has a mission, get out of the way. He plunged into spider city with a broom and some garbage bags, and ten minutes later I could actually tell it was a room.
He walked out with a big grin, wiping his hands together. “All yours, sweetie.”
“There’s a spider on your shirt,” I said.
He looked down and squashed it with his hand.
“Ew,” I said, stepping around him and cautiously walking into my room.
It did look spider-free. It was actually a lot bigger than my old bedroom, with a large double window looking out onto the woods behind the house and lots of space for my bed and dresser, along with the new desk my parents had bought me. There was even a walk-in closet. I wasn’t much of a clothes person, but who doesn’t like closet space?
My mom followed me in. She was definitely a clothes person. She liked to do her makeup and hair and always wore lots of jewellery. We didn’t have much in common.
“What did I tell you?” she said, putting her arm around my shoulders. “I made sure you got this room. Haven’t you always wanted a walk-in closet?”
“I guess,” I replied. “I only have, like, ten shirts.”
She smiled. “We’ll buy you more. This is a new start for all of us. You can go to school on Monday and make new friends and leave the miserable bullies in Newcastle behind. This is going to be great, Laura. Trust me.”
I watched as a surviving spider lowered itself from my ceiling.
I looked at my mom, and she forced a smile.
“Eventually.”
When she left, I reluctantly started unpacking my stuff from the small trailer we’d lugged over here. My parents had basically bought all new furniture for the move, and there were already huge boxes scattered around the main floor when we arrived—dropped off by the store. Everything was a bit rushed: we’d only officially gotten possession of the house last week as it had taken the summer to close and finalize everything with the bank, so there wasn’t a lot of prep time. The rest of our stuff had already been moved here through the week by Stache, so all we’d brought with us today were clothes and other random personal possessions. For me that wasn’t much. Besides my clothes, I had some books, a laptop, two big boxes of trophies, and another small box of collectibles—random things that I’d kept, like a pen that was my grandpa’s and an old coin I’d found the night my nana died. I was always close to my grandparents. Just my dad’s mom, Grandma Elly, was left now.
After hauling everything upstairs, I started hanging my clothes up, marvelling at how much space I had now. Walk-in closets were kind of cool. It was definitely old-fashioned though: large white wooden panels covered the bottom half of the closet, while the top half and ceiling were finished with regular plaster. I didn’t even want to know how many spiders had been in here. I shoved the trophy boxes in the bottom corner and was just turning to leave when I noticed something written o
n one of the panels. I leaned down for a closer look. There were small, crooked words carved into the wood:
It’s not too late.
“Oh…perfect,” I murmured, looking around uneasily. It looked like the words had been carved into the panel with a pocket knife or something. But what did it mean?
Frowning, I shook my head and went to unpack my last box. Just one more creepy thing in a creepy house. Maybe it meant it wasn’t too late to move out of here again. But could my parents be convinced? Judging by the way my dad was basically skipping around the house, I sincerely doubted it. I would just have to try and settle in. Somehow. I left most of my little collectibles in the box, at least until I could get my dresser up here. I did pause and gingerly pick up the old black pen, thinking about my grandpa Roger. I wished he was here. He would have snuck me some German chocolates and laughed about how I could become a biologist here, specializing in spiders. I missed his laugh.
I put the pen back in the box and climbed to my feet, deciding to check out the yard. Maybe there was a pool or something. I walked over to the window and looked outside, scanning the forest that encircled our overgrown backyard. It was mostly tall, narrow oak trees, packed tightly enough that it grew dark just a metre into the woods, even during the daytime. Thick brush filled the space between the trees, as well as squat pines that blocked out much of the sunlight breaking through the overcast sky. It wasn’t a happy-looking forest. I probably wouldn’t be hiking very much.
I was just turning away when I saw a strange flicker of colour. I squinted, trying to peer into the shadows. Leaning close to the glass, my eyes fell on a particularly dark one. As the shadow took shape, the sunlight caught another flash of pale blue. Eyes.
Suddenly the shadow became a recognizable form, and I realized with trembling hands that a man was standing in the forest, staring right at me.
Chapter Three
I froze, unable to scream or move or even look away. The man was tall, but it was difficult to see much else of his face beyond those piercing blue eyes as he was wearing a loose-fitting hood or cowl. The hood flowed back into a long cloak, making his shape indistinguishable as well. But there was no mistaking a second glint of light at his waist, where the tip of a gleaming sword protruded from the cloak. The shadowy figure just stared at me for a long moment, his cold eyes locked on mine, and then he stepped back into the darkness and disappeared completely. When he was gone, I slowly moved away from the window, feeling my skin crawl.
