The neat yard cleared of leaves. The single ghost hanging from the porch rafters, just enough to be festive, not enough to invite people in. The white walls and pale blue trim.
A festering wound within.
I stare at the house and wonder at how similar we are, the house and I. Both put together from the outside. A mess on the inside.
I stare, and it seems like darkness seeps in on the edges. Until it’s just me and the house, the two of us floating in darkness. Birds of a feather. Broken but not quite beautiful.
Movement.
Light flickers.
Not in the upstairs windows, but in the basement. I see it from the squat windows peeking above the tilled flower beds. See it through the heavy curtains.
I hear it.
The hiss of electricity.
The hiss of serpents.
But this time, they don’t scare me. Not really. In a twisted way, the sound makes me feel at home. Scared. Which is precisely where I belong.
The front door clicks open. Just an inch. Light flickers within. Inviting me in.
Calling me back.
Hissing whispers, beckoning. The ground slithers with them, snakes crawling over the grass, twisting over my shoes, but I don’t fear them, not now.
I’m home.
I’m supposed to be home.
I take a step forward, toward the door that opens another inch, toward the snakes slithering over the doorframe.
A step home.
And a car of high schoolers drives past, honking the horn and blasting music, laughing out the windows, and the darkness is gone, and the snakes are gone, and I am standing on the other side of the street staring at the closed front door of the house I tried so hard to escape.
I shudder hard.
Why am I back here?
Why did I come here?
I turn and hurry down the street.
As I round the corner, I swear I hear a voice from the house, faintly calling out my name.
I can’t tell if it’s my father or the clown.
I can’t tell if there’s a difference.
“Wow,” I say as we step inside Caroline’s house. “Your place is amazing!”
Caroline lives on the edge of town—which isn’t that far, since our town is pretty small—in a huge house that looks like a museum. Maybe it’s because I have so many brothers, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen my place look this immaculate, no matter how many times my parents clean—or, as is often the case, force us to clean. Like, there are sculptures on the bookshelves and coffee table that I know would have been broken within an hour of being in my house. The first floor is open concept, with the kitchen open to the dining and living rooms, everything white and gray and perfect and lit by expensive-looking Edison-style lights and huge windows overlooking a yard filled with flower beds and trees.
“Thank you,” Caroline says, blushing wildly. “Though it’s not so fun on cleaning day.”
We put our shoes in the entry hall and bring our bags to the basement den. Because of course this place has a basement den.
“Do you think he’ll get here okay?” April asks as we head down the carpeted steps. Somehow, they’ve even managed to keep the carpet white and immaculate.
“Kyle?” I reply. “Of course.”
I try to keep my voice assured, but in all honesty, I’m worried about him. It’s taking all my self-control not to send a dozen texts asking where he is and if he needs a ride. We headed to each of our houses and then to the store before coming here, and we didn’t see Kyle the entire time. Maybe he was taking some side streets. But in a town this size, where you see literally everyone everywhere all the time, it worries me.
I refuse to let the dark questions enter my mind, but they push at the edges.
What if the clown already took him? What if you’ll never see him again?
The last makes my heart hurt, which is why I force it away.
The den is just as huge and clean as the rest of the house, with a few short windows in the upper corners and the biggest sectional sofa I’ve ever seen taking up three-quarters of the space. It curves around a coffee table covered in art books, and a TV the size of a small car is mounted to a wall, with a fireplace and a few gaming systems beneath.
“I figured we could sleep down here tonight,” she says. “There should be enough room for three or so on the sofa, and we have air beds we can bring out—I’ll move the coffee table out of the way. The bathroom is in there”—she points to the only other door down here—“and, yeah. Make yourselves at home.”
Deshaun and April and I share a glance. We’ve all been to each other’s houses, and not one of us lives anywhere nearly as nice as this. We stand there awkwardly, holding our bags of clothes and candy. But then I shrug and smile and head over to the sofa, flopping down and dropping my backpack to the floor, then dumping the grocery bag of candy across the coffee table.
The spell breaks, and the rest of my friends start settling in.
“Dad said he’d be home in an hour or so,” Caroline says. “Is everyone okay with taco night?”
“Totally!” Deshaun says, stretching out on the sofa and poking April in the side, making her jump. She swats at him and giggles.
For a split second I can almost pretend that everything is how it was a year ago. Before we started going our separate ways, when we spent almost every waking moment together as a group. But the moment I think that, the space beside me feels emptier—this is where Kyle should be, but he’s out there on his own.
Out there alone.
At least, I hope he’s alone.
I pull out my phone and text him while the others head back upstairs to grab some snack food.
Kyle responds to my text fairly quickly. On my way. There in five.
I sigh and flop back on the sofa.
And keep sinking.
“Wh-what?” I stutter.
I try to sit up, but that movement makes me sink deeper.
I reach down to press myself up. My hand pushes through the leather of the sofa.
It’s no longer leather.
It’s quicksand.
I yelp and struggle to sit up, but the more I move, the faster the quicksand sucks me down. It squishes against me, reaches up past my chest. I struggle harder. Sink deeper. The sand presses all around me. Squeezes the air out of my lungs.
And above me, on the white ceiling, a million tiny black stars appear.
No, not stars.
Spiders.
Scuttling
down
the walls.
Swarming me.
I can hear their little feet, the clicking of their pincers as they draw near, heading toward my face and hands, the only parts of me left above the quicksand. They’re going to attack me. I squeeze my eyes and mouth shut. I ready for their little prickly legs, the sharp bite of their pincers. I want to scream, but I know if I do, they’ll crawl down my throat.
Something hard smacks me on the forehead.
I gasp and look up, jolting upright.
I can sit upright.
April and the others are standing at the foot of the stairs. Deshaun has a handful of candy—he chucked a candy bar at my head.
“Yo, dude,” he says. “You okay? You look like you zoned out for a minute.”
“Quicksand,” I gasp. I push myself to stand. My heart races so fast I feel like I ran a mile in gym. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep on that sofa. I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep ever again.
“Quicksand?” April asks. She takes one step toward me.
“And spiders.”
That stops her. She hates spiders. She looks around wildly, as if expecting them to leap from the shadows at her. But the spiders—just like the quicksand—are gone.
“What?” Deshaun whispers. “You saw both? At the same time?”
“But that’s impossible,” April says.
Caroline shakes her head.
“No, don’t you see? Now that it’s st
ronger, it can show us anything to scare us. It can use anyone’s fear.” She looks from April to Deshaun and then to me. “It’s gotten smarter. We can’t know what to expect anymore. None of us are safe.”
“But it’s all just in our heads, right?” Deshaun asks.
Right. Caroline hadn’t told him where she’d gotten the scratch on her face. She opens her mouth to speak, but before she can, I feel something under my fingernails.
“I don’t think so,” I whisper, pulling out a few grains of sand. Deshaun steps forward and peers at the sand on my fingertip.
“No way,” he whispers. April and Caroline crowd in behind him, but right as they near, right as he reaches for the granules, the sand disappears.
“It can make things real now,” Deshaun whispers. He swallows hard and looks up at me.
And no matter how many times he’s said it, no matter how much we’ve all tried to convince ourselves to just be strong, don’t let fear get to you, I can see it in his eyes.
He’s terrified.
Even though I faced my own nightmares in my bedroom years ago, it feels different to know the clown has made its way into my house to attack others. Different knowing that this time, it can leave a trace. It feels worse.
We aren’t safe here.
We aren’t safe anywhere.
We sit there for a few minutes, trying to formulate some sort of plan. But there is no plan. Last time, the clown only attacked us when we were alone and vulnerable. Last time, it only showed us what we were personally afraid of. Last time, it didn’t leave a trace.
Last time, we had a chance of standing up to it and winning.
The doorbell rings and I jump.
“Kyle,” Andres says.
“I’ll get it,” I respond. “I was going to start making cider, anyway.”
As I walk up the steps, a clinging sadness hits me. Like when I glance over my shoulder, that will be the last time I see my friends again. I know that’s not true. It can’t be true.
But right now, all things feel possible. I don’t want to let any of my friends out of my sight.
I’m scared of what will happen when I do.
I make my way to the front door. The doorbell rings right as I reach out toward the doorknob.
I freeze. My hands hover an inch from the handle.
Something feels off.
Something feels wrong.
Outside, I swear I hear the jingle of bells.
My heart lodged in my throat, I lean forward.
Toward the peephole.
To see who is outside.
To see my mother.
She stands there in the dress we buried her in, dirt caking her skin, clumps of earth and vines tangled in her hair, her skin mottled and peeling and gray.
“Let me in, Sunnybunny,” she says in her silky voice. “I’ve missed you so much. I just want to hold you close and never let go. Sunnybunny, are you there?”
Her eyes suddenly blaze blue. She leans forward, her burning blue eye going straight to the peephole. I yelp and jump back.
“I seeee yoouuuu,” she calls in a singsong voice. Only it’s not her voice anymore. It also sounds like the clown.
“Let me in, Sunnybunny!” she calls out. Her fist slams against the door. I take a step back.
She pounds again on the door, making the frame rattle. “LET ME IN!” she howls. She slams the door with every word. “LET! ME! IN! LET! ME! IN!”
Tears fill my eyes and I stumble backward and the whole wall is rattling, is shaking, is about to crash down.
“Please,” I whisper. “Please go away.”
The pounding stops.
Silence stretches, so deep I can hear the thud thud thud of my frantic heart.
“Caroliiiiiine,” my mother sings. Her voice seems to shift outside, circling the house impossibly. “I’m coming for you, Sunnybunny. Mommy’s been so lonely. Don’t you want to join Mommy?” The voice pauses. Right behind me. I don’t turn around, but I swear I smell the grave dirt on her. Swear I feel her breath on my neck. “After all,” she growls, “my death is all. Your. Fault!”
Her hands slap down on my shoulders just as the doorbell rings again.
I scream and turn around.
But there’s no one there. No one there.
The door opens and I scream a second time, whipping back around, but it’s only Kyle.
He stares at me.
“Sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to barge in, but I’ve been ringing for a while, and then I heard a scream and—”
I cut him off, running toward him and wrapping my arms around him, because he’s real, he’s solid and warm and real, and before I know it, I’m sobbing on his shoulder and he’s awkwardly putting his arms around me.
“It’s okay,” he whispers. “It’s okay.”
I sob harder.
Because it’s not.
It’s not.
There’s a new rule: No one is allowed to be alone. Ever.
“That’s going to make going to the bathroom a little awkward,” Andres says, but April’s glare knocks the humor out of him. “Just trying to lighten the mood,” he mutters. Not that it works. The mood is anything but light.
The five of us stand in Caroline’s kitchen. After Kyle came in and Caroline relayed what had happened to her, she didn’t want to be alone up here. And honestly, the rest of us didn’t want to be alone in Caroline’s basement. Even if there were four of us and even if it was nicer than most of our actual living rooms, it was still a basement.
It was still underground,
difficult to escape. If we had to escape. Not that I thought there was an escape. I’d even brought a few protective amulets and crystals from the house, but seeing that the clown could actually hurt people made all that feel like child’s play. Toys wouldn’t hurt a monster that strong. Nothing could.
“What do you think it wants?” I ask.
“To scare us,” April says.
“It’s doing a good job so far,” Caroline replies.
April doesn’t say anything, but I catch her biting her lip in worry.
I know she feels guilty that she hasn’t seen anything. I know she feels—somehow—like this is all her fault. I know because I feel guilt as well. I’ve had two years to plan and protect, and I’ve gotten lazy. I’m no more prepared to fight this thing than I was the first time.
“I never should have brought it up yesterday,” I hear April whisper. I put my arm over her shoulders.
“It isn’t your fault,” I say. Even though we all know it’s true, it doesn’t make her feel any better.
Caroline has the TV on in the background, playing some sitcom with a prerecorded laugh track. It’s strange, the five of us standing there in near silence, with the TV laughing in the background at jokes we only half catch. Nothing seems funny right now. Nothing.
I look over to Kyle. He’s the only one not in the kitchen. He sits on the sofa closest to the door leading to the back porch, staring outside, saying nothing. He hasn’t said much since coming in. When April bravely asked if he’d seen anything on his walk, he shook his head. But I know how his shoulders hang when he’s lying.
I wish I could get him away to ask him what’s wrong, but that would break the number one rule. We have to stick together. Have to. I know that if I were to push Kyle, he’d leave.
I feel worst for Andres; he’s tried comforting Kyle a number of times, but Kyle is being a jerk and ignoring him. I can tell it hurts Andres’s feelings, and I know that’s why Andres keeps trying to be funny. I don’t know if I want to give Kyle a hug and tell him it’s going to be okay or punch him in the shoulder for being so mean. I can’t forget what he said at lunch, can’t forget how angry he looked.
I wasn’t just saying it earlier; he reminded me of his father. At least, of what I’d heard about his father. I’d only seen his dad once, in passing, but even that had been enough to creep me out. I can’t believe Kyle was able to last as long in that house as he did.
&n
bsp; “Here,” Caroline says, handing me a mug.
I jolt in surprise; I’ve been so in my head I haven’t even noticed her ladling out the mugs of steaming spiced cider.
“Thanks,” I reply.
She smiles in response and goes over to give Kyle his. He takes it and holds it in his hands, still staring out the window.
“To us,” Caroline says when she’s returned with her own mug. “To a friendship that will last forever.”
“To friendship,” April replies. We all raise our mugs and clink. All except Kyle, who drinks his without looking at us.
April glances over at him, her face concerned.
“Don’t worry,” I whisper, hoping he can’t hear over the laugh track of the TV. “He’ll be okay.”
The laughing on the TV grows louder.
For some reason, chills race over my skin. I turn and face the television.
The characters on the sitcom all sit in a living room on their sofas. But they’re no longer talking to each other. They’re staring at us. Laughing.
“They think they’re safe,” says one of the TV characters. More laughter erupts from the speakers, so loud it hurts my ears.
“They think they can stop me,” says another.
More laughter.
“They think that I can’t hurt them,” says a third.
Uproarious laughter, so loud it makes the sculptures rattle on their pedestals.
“But I can,” they say in unison. “I can hurt them whenever I want to now.”
More laughter. One of the sculptures beside me topples over, an intricate glass piece, shattering all over the ground. Glass explodes around me.
As one, the five of us jump and yelp out in fear.
The TV turns to static.
I look down, panting, to see two thin lines across my arm begin to bleed, from where the glass shot out and scratched me.
“Deshaun!” April yells, grabbing hold of my arm. Caroline is there in a heartbeat with a clean towel.
Seconds later, everyone is there, crowding around me, making sure I’m okay.
Adrenaline courses through my veins, so strong I can’t feel a thing. It feels like a dream. A very, very bad dream.
“You all saw that,” I say. It isn’t a question.
Caroline looks up from bandaging my arm with gauze. The wounds aren’t too deep. It’s okay. We’re okay. For now.
The Fear Zone 2 Page 6
