Those Most Apt to Crash: A Halloween Story - Part 2
“Okay, Kara. Now, when I first heard the story, it came from those boys. They said the twin girls’ grandma died, and they wanted to talk to her. So they got their hands on a Ouija board and tried to talk to her—do you know how those work?”
“Yes, I know what a Ouija board is. You’re not supposed to use them because you never know who you’re really talking to.”
“Well, that’s just the problem they had. The boys said those two girls conjured a demon, and at one point it actually showed up. They were running their hands over the board, getting answers from somebody they thought was their grandma. The whole time they were getting tricked into reciting some incantation that let this hideous monster escape from wherever he came from.”
“What’s an incantation?”
“It’s like a prayer or a magic spell. Like if you say the wrong words, you can curse someone or call for some supernatural being to appear. And that’s what they said happened. They followed the demon’s instructions on how to release him and then he was able to come right into the basement. The girls of course were terrified and ran from it. That’s why they ran up here. That’s why this place is still standing here empty. Because apparently the girls opened some kind of portal, so demons can come and go through the basement whenever they want.”
“Crystal, you said the story wasn’t scary!”
“Just listen. That was the story I heard from that group of boys a couple years ago. Then just a few weeks back I talked to Mike and the other guys down the street. He said he heard the story from his older brother’s friend. And here’s the kicker, he never heard anything about a Ouija board. He said he never heard anything about the girls’ grandmother dying either.”
“So the story’s not true at all?”
“Oh, Mike told me a completely different story. He said one of the twin girls started acting really strange, like waking up screaming in the middle of the night and tearing her clothes off in school, crazy stuff like that. So the parents called a priest to perform an exorcism—that’s when you cast an evil spirit out of someone’s body.”
“I know what an exorcism is.”
“Guess where the priest took the girl for the ritual. That’s right, the basement. Things got really intense in there, and the girl’s sister heard her screaming through the door. She thought they must be hurting the girl because it sounded so bad. Like they were torturing her. So when things got quiet for a second, the girl burst in, grabbed her sister by the arm, and ran out with her. They ran all the way up here, and, well…” Crystal turns and gestures toward the window. “According to this story, the priest succeeded in casting the evil spirit out of the girl before the sister rushed in and took her away. And some people say it’s still here. Ooh-whoo-oo.” She holds up her hands, wiggling her fingers around the device she’s holding, splashing the mess of light over the floor and windows.
Kara, frightened and frustrated, squints her eyes accusingly at her sister. “How do you know that story isn’t true? How do you know they’re not both true?”
“Why? Are you scared of the demon—the two demons that hang out in this place?”
“Crystal, you said the stories weren’t scary. And, no, I’m not scared. I’m just mad because the stories aren’t like what you said.”
“Keep listening then. It gets better. About a week ago, I went to Mom and asked her what happened in this house. And the story she told me didn’t have any dead grandmothers or demons or possessed girls at all.”
“What story did she tell you?”
“She says this house was originally built a couple decades earlier than most people think. It’s just been renovated a few times. The story she heard growing up was about teenagers, not little girls, and one of them got pregnant. This was back when everyone freaked out anytime a girl got pregnant before she was married, and abortion was illegal. You know what an abortion is, right? That’s when you end a pregnancy, so it’s basically killing the baby. Now, some people say the baby can’t feel anything yet. But some people say it’s just murder. Anyway, it was illegal back then, but now it’s not. Back then, you had to find a doctor who would do it in secret. Basically, if you just went on and had the baby your life was ruined because no one would want to marry you. And if you put the baby up for adoption, everyone would still know you’d been pregnant, so it wouldn’t matter.”
Kara understands, dimly. Babies need dads. If there is no dad, you can’t have a baby. But didn’t there have to be a dad for her to get pregnant? Where did that guy go? Why didn’t the girl’s parents make him marry her? Maybe he just refused.
Crystal continues. “So the girl’s parents find a doctor who will do a secret abortion. Guess where he does it. Here’s the thing, though. The doctor didn’t even put the girl to sleep first. So when he starts, she starts screaming bloody murder. Once again, who shows up to save her? You guessed it. Her sister bursts through the door, grabs her by the arm, and runs with her up here. The doctor is trying to get the girl back downstairs so he can finish doing whatever he was doing. So it’s out the window. What Mom heard was that the girl who fell and died was the one who was pregnant, and she’s the one who’s haunting the house till this day. That’s why people kept moving in and then moving out. They all found out it was haunted. That was until about eight years ago, when people just stopped buying the place and no one has lived here since.”
“Mom said this story is true?”
“No, she never said it was true. She just said it’s the story she heard growing up.”
“Do you think that story is true? Which one do you think is right? Maybe they all are?”
“Hang on a second. You see, after asking Mom what she knew about this place, I went to Dad. He said he’d heard a ghost story about this place growing up too. The story he heard is about an evil dad who took his twin daughters into that room in the basement and did gross stuff with them he shouldn’t be doing. Sexual stuff. One day, the girls put up a fight, and they managed to get past their dad. They ran out the door and up the stairs to where we are now. Or was it that one of the girls came back to rescue the other? I can’t remember. Anyway, the dad chased them, and so when they got up here, they had to go out the window. One of them died, just like you heard, and the other escaped but walked with a cane the rest of her life. In this version too it’s the girl who died whose ghost haunts this place. But then it’s the same as in Mom’s story where a bunch of people move in and out over the years because it’s haunted.”
“That’s a horrible story. They’re all horrible stories. I don’t understand. Did they all happen? That would make this place just plain evil. Let’s just get out of here and talk at home. Please.”
“Don’t you see, Kara? This place isn’t evil. It’s just an abandoned house that looks creepy because it’s out here in the middle of nowhere. For some reason, it’s sat here empty a long time, and people started telling stories about it. Before long, no one could tell if the stories were supposed to be true or not.”
“But why would they make up stories? Why would they make up stories like that?”
“That’s what I asked Dad. You know what he said? Stories start out simple. Like maybe one of the girls really did fall, and maybe the family that lived here really did have to move out. But then everyone who tells the story changes it a little, because they want to impress people—like your friend Gloria. Everyone changes it just a little bit, so they don’t feel like they’re lying. But as the story goes from person to person, year after year, it can change into something crazy. Pretty soon, people have different versions to choose from. They may hear one of the other versions of the story, but then just forget it because it doesn’t mean much to them. But if it does mean something to them, then they’ll start believing. He said Mom is a feminist. And abortion is a big deal to feminists, so that’s the story she likes. If you’re Catholic, you like the story about the exorcised demon. Do you see how it works?”
“But I don’t like any of the stories.”
“That’s just it. People look at this empty house, and they fill it with what scares them. They tell the scary story that’s scariest to them. Because everyone agrees this place is scary. They just can’t agree on what’s scary about it. And the thing is, I’ve been afraid of this place since I was a little girl, before I heard any of the stories. And I don’t want to carry that fear around with me the rest of my life. Or maybe it’s like Dad said, I want to be more mature, more adult, so I need to conquer what I’m most afraid of. If I don’t, I’ll just get old and go through horrible stuff and not get anything I want in life. That’s why I had to come in here. And that’s why I’m going down to the basement now. It’s all made up anyway.”
The sound of a car passing the end of the driveway draws both girls to the window. They see it safely off before turning back to the room, back to the dead animal swinging gently from the ceiling, back to the message, back to the emptiness where battling stories retreat in despair of ever achieving primacy. Crystal sighs, reaches over to squeeze Kara’s hand, and walks to the door. Kara takes a good long look around the room. Does she feel dread? If she does, what would that even mean? She tries to conjure an image of demons or little ghost twins. All she comes up with is a group of stupid boys trying to outdo each other by making things up. Still, when she hears Crystal’s footsteps nearing the top of the stairs, she’s halfway down the hall before deciding to take a step.
On her way down the stairs, Crystal stops and cranes to ask, “Are you going into the basement with me?” Kara thinks she will. Then she thinks she won’t. Crystal says, “You don’t have come in. You can wait outside the door. I only want to go in long enough to get a good look at whatever’s in there. It won’t take more than a minute. Then we get our butts back to our bikes and ride home before Dad gets there.”
They continue down the steps in silence. Kara still doesn’t know if she’ll go in with her sister. Maybe the stories aren’t true. But it’s so dark. She wishes she’d taken the time to find another flashlight for herself before leaving the garage. Does she really need to go in there? Is there anything worthwhile she could take from the room, like something she could use against Gloria? Maybe, but then Crystal will let her know. Yes, that’s the idea. She’ll wait outside until Crystal has checked it out, and then maybe she’ll go in herself.
“You go in and check, and then I’ll come in. Okay?”
“Yeah, that’s what I’ll do.”
They stop on the ground floor landing to look over at the living room and the boarded entryway. Kara has an impulse to run to the door and rush home. She’s got so much to think about for one thing. Her journey seems complete in that she’s already learned enough for one night. Going any farther feels like tempting fate.
“Okay,” Crystal says, turning the flashlight back onto the descending stairs. “Here we go.” Kara knows she’s scared but forcing herself to go down one step after the other regardless. The flashlight shines on a small exposed concrete area at the bottom of the stairs and a door a few feet beyond, a perfect space for Kara to wait while Crystal takes an initial look in the main room.
“Nothing ever happened here,” Crystal mutters, mostly to herself. “It’s just some stairs and a basement, nothing to be afraid of.”
When Crystal steps onto the concrete, stained dark gray by patches of moisture, she turns back to see Kara hesitating a few steps up. “Is that all the farther you want to go?”
“No, I’ll come down.”
Crystal turns back to the door. Kara watches her shoulders rise theatrically as she gulps down a giant breath. Then she closes her eyes tight. When she opens them, Crystal is gone. The light folds and pinches out as the door seals shut. Alone, Kara is overcome with desperation to join her sister. She inches down the remaining steps in the darkness, slides her feet across the concrete, and gropes for the doorknob. Her hand drops abruptly back to her side when she hears Crystal scream.
Kara stands rigid, staring at the door she can barely see. A moment passes before she hears her sister shout, “Kara, don’t come in here.”
“Why did you scream? What’s in there?”
“Just wait please. I need a minute. It’s fine. I’m safe.”
Kara opens her mouth to protest but halts when she hears voices from upstairs. Then she hears stomping and scraping, someone pushing through the board covering the doorway from the porch. Stupidly, she first imagines it’s their parents. Then she remembers the animal carcass dangling from the ceiling on the second floor. What kind of person does that?
“Crystal.”
“I said wait a second.”
“Crystal, someone’s here. Upstairs. I can hear them.”
Laughter infused with exaggerated defiance, maybe a touch of cruelty, cascades down the darkened staircase. A guy’s voice is saying, “…telling you we were just here and whatever you heard at school it ain’t true.” A girl responds, “I know it isn’t true, but there could be a crazy bum in here for all we know.”
Kara recognizes the voice. She turns back toward the door as the sound of more people squeezing through the front entrance reaches her ears. She and Crystal are trapped. There’s no way to escape. These are kids she knows from school. But she senses both she and her sister are in danger. She backs up against the door and listens intently.
The guy’s voice booms, “Alright, First-timer, you get to do the honors of going upstairs first.”
Now, a second girl’s voice responds, “Fine, but if any of you idiots tries to scare me somehow, I’m going to kick you in the balls.”
Kara springs away from the door. Her body, which felt soft and exposed, shifts into a forwardly inclined attitude. The voice belongs to Gloria, and Kara heard one of the guys she’s with say this is her first time here. “Gotcha,” Kara whispers.
“Don’t worry, Gloria,” says another guy’s voice. “I won’t let them pull anything, and I’ll be right behind you.”
Kara can identify this voice too. The doorknob twists behind her. She turns to look at whatever may be emerging from the room her sister disappeared into but sees nothing through the darkness.
“Kara,” Crystal whispers.
“It’s Gloria,” Kara says. “And Nick is with her, and some other guys.”
Kara stands there in the dark wondering what her sister will do. A plan starts forming in her own mind. They can let the newcomers all go upstairs after Gloria, and then they can run up the stairs and out the front door to their bikes. But what if they don’t all go upstairs? Maybe she and her sister can rush past them anyway.
“Don’t tell them I’m down here,” Crystal says. “I have an idea. See if you can get them all in the ground-floor living room, away from the stairs.” Kara hears the door sealing and the latch sliding into its slot with a metallic knock. Astonished, she lets her hand shoot toward where she remembers the knob resides.
“Hey, who’s down there?” The tiny space she occupies explodes into view in the abrupt jerking beam of a flashlight. “What in the world are you doing down there?” Kara doesn’t know this voice, and all she sees up the stairs is the yellow-white burst of the light pointed at her face. “Oh crap, you didn’t go in there, did you?”
“No,” Kara says evenly. “I’m exploring. I was about to go in when I heard you guys coming in.”
“You came here by yourself? And you were going in that room without a flashlight?”
Before Kara can answer, he turns back to the living room to say, “You’ll never guess whose bike that was by the tree out front.”
The bikes. Kara’s mind travels back to when she and her sister first rode up to the house. She’d been desperate to salvage her plan after realizing Gloria could have someone else read their message. Where did Crystal leave her bike? Searching her memory, she finds nothing but blankness. But hadn’t he, whoever he is, just said they only saw one bike? Briefly, she turns her head to see if the door is still closed. What can this idea of Crystal’s be?
“Kara? Oh my God.” It’s Gloria. “You came here by yourself? Holy crap! Nice pajamas.”
Now the guy says, “Why don’t you come up here with us? Gloria was about to go upstairs and check out the room where those two girls jumped out the window. It’s her first time here.”
“Shut up Larry! I’ve been here before.”
The sides of Kara’s lips slide slowly up over her gums and back across her molars. Her hand leaps up to cover her mouth. “Hey, would you get that light out of my face?” she says, disguising the gesture. “I’ll come up there and check out the upstairs with you guys.”
“You weren’t really going in there by yourself?” Gloria asks, though it sounds more like an accusation. Kara can hear the shame in her voice and imagines red blotches blossoming beneath the clusters of brown freckles on her dollish cheeks. “And in your pajamas no less. That’s kind of a creepy thing to do, don’t you think?”
Plagiarizing her sister, Kara says, “I’ve been afraid of this place since I was a little girl, and I don’t want to carry that fear around with me the rest of my life. So I’m here to check this place out and prove to myself there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
Gloria laughs. “Well, aren’t you a brave little hero?”
“Braver than you.”
The older kid, Larry, backs away laughing. “Ooh, she’s got you there.”
“Shut up, Larry. She’s here because this is a creepy place and she’s a creepy little girl. She’s probably playing with herself down there.”
“I am not!”
Gloria has never said anything outrightly mean to her before.
“Give her a break, Gloria,” Nick says. And there he is at the top of the stairs, his complicated eyes severe in the shadows. He reaches up and pulls at Larry’s arm to redirect the flashlight. “You really came here by yourself? That’s hardcore. Why don’t you come up here and we’ll check out the upstairs first. Then, if you two are up for it, we’ll come back down to check out the basement.”
Kara picks up from his suggestion that they don’t want her to go through the door. There must be something inside they don’t want her to see, the same thing Crystal saw that made her scream. But what is she supposed to do? She waits long enough to make sure Crystal isn’t going to say anything, and then she starts climbing back up the stairs.
“So,” Gloria says, “you just decided to jump on your bike and ride out here to wander around in this dark house with no flashlight?”
“I told you, I wanted to overcome my fear. So I forced myself to come in here. And I wanted to do it in the scariest way I could think of.”
“That takes courage,” Nick says.
“Well, that takes something,” Gloria says. “I’m not sure courage in the right word.”
Larry chimes in, “It’s more courage than any of us had.”
“Yeah,” Gloria says, “I’m not convinced. What were you really doing down there?”
“I told you!”
“You two shut up,” Larry says. “Gloria, you want to do the honors?” He stands aside, his mouth deranged by a mocking, conspicuously half-concealed grin, as he lifts his hand palm out to usher her into the hallway at the top of the stairs.
Kara’s lips pull back again, but this time it’s dark enough she doesn’t have to hide it. Gloria inches toward the room at the end of the hall. Kara knows what’s in store for her. The one-sidedness of the knowledge fills her with amusement and pride. But what’s all this about playing with herself? What’s she saying exactly? Kara understands just well enough to be embarrassed. How can she respond when Gloria says it again? She has an idea.
“Hey, Gloria, what’s taking you so long?” she says. “Are you playing with yourself over there?”
Larry convulses with laughter, startling Kara. Even Nick can’t resist some shoulder-bouncing chuckles he tries to muffle.
Gloria whips around and glares, her eyes full of hate. “If you’re so brave, what are you doing back there with the guys protecting you?”
Kara steps casually out from behind Larry and strides purposefully, fearlessly, down the hall, breezes past Gloria, who now looks more stricken than angry, steps into the room, and turns with her arms out to her sides, presenting herself undeterred, unharmed, triumphant. Her victory is overshadowed by her noticing that Larry and Nick are exchanging a troubled looked in the half shadow behind the flashlight.
Gloria storms down the hall and springs into the room. She seizes up when her gaze finally reaches the dangling animal. “Oh gross! What the hell is that? Oh my God. Did you guys hang that thing up there?”
Nick and Larry are making their way down the hall, followed by another guy and another girl. “Well, in point of fact, we didn’t hang it there,” Larry says. “But we did think you might get a kick out of finding it. Too bad creepy pajama girl here had to ruin the surprise.”
“Creepy pajama girl!” Gloria repeats before leaning back and crowing with laughter. “That’s why you weren’t scared to come in here. You were probably in here playing with yourself before you went downstairs.”
Kara turns toward Nick, who laughs along with the others. She closes her eyes to think hard about how to respond, but her insides are turning liquid and oozing into heavy puddles weighing down her chin, her shoulders, her belly. Her knees feel like they’re about to give out. Finally, she manages to disgorge the words, “I wasn’t playing with myself. I came up here to conquer my fear. I bet none of you are brave enough to come in here alone.”
Larry says, “Yeah, that’s because we’re not creepy little perverts who wander around the dark in our pajamas.”
Gloria bludgeons Kara with her guffaws, hurling them at her, trying to beat her down with them. “That’s right. And your sister is a creepy little pervert too,” she says.
“My sister is braver and smarter and… and just better than any of you.” She’s never hated her own words so much, never felt their inadequacy with such abject shame. Gloria continues with her fake laugh, barely putting any effort into making it sound genuine.
Nick breaks in to say, “Hey, maybe we should get out of here. It might be a better idea to just come back another night.” He lifts his eyebrows at Larry as he tilts his head toward Kara, who’s too dejected to wonder what the gesture could mean.
Larry sighs and runs his left hand over his stubbled scalp before turning toward the wall to shout, “Shit!”, startling Kara. “You know what?” he says. “No, we’re not going to leave, but we’re going to send creepy pjs here on her way. Time to go home, creepy little girl.”
“I’m not going home if I don’t want to,” Kara says, realizing that’s exactly what she’d most like to do. But there’s no way she’s going to let these guys find her sister downstairs and start harassing her too. “You’re just mad because you wanted to scare your girlfriend and now you can’t.”
Larry whips around and grabs Kara by the top of her arm. “Oh, you don’t think I can be scary just because you decided to come here to play with yourself tonight?”
Nick reaches over to clutch Larry’s other arm, saying, “Hey man, take it easy. She’s just a kid.”
“Oh, I’m not going to hurt her. But you can be damn sure I’m about to escort her out. Now listen, Kara. We wanted to show this place to Gloria, and we were going to initiate her into our group. Nothing personal, but our initiation is secret, and you’re already disrupting it. So what we’re going to do is we’re all going to go downstairs and see that you get nice and safe to your bike.” He dons an exaggerated, ghoulish smile. “Then you can get the hell out of here and go home. I’m guessing your parents don’t know you’re out here. I bet they’d be grateful if I told them.”
Kara’s only concern now is figuring out how to clear a path for Crystal to escape. Her intuition tells her these kids pose a real danger. They’ll be mad when they find her sister, just like they’re mad at Kara right now, only worse. And this Larry kid is a total jerk. He’s the one who seems the most determined to scare Gloria like they planned. Now that he’s already furious because she’s ruined the first phase of his plan, there’s no telling what he’ll do if Crystal ruins the next. The only way out is through the front door. Maybe there’s another door in the back, but it’s probably boarded up more securely. Kara’s failure to come up with a solution frustrates her, and her frustration eats away at her patience with Larry.
Swinging her arm up over her head to break his grip, she says, “I bet my mom and dad wouldn’t be too grateful if I told them about you grabbing me, you jerk.” She rubs her arm, even though it doesn’t hurt. “But, fine, I’ll go home. I don’t want to know what your stupid secret club does anyway. I just think you all should check out the tree outside before you go down to the basement.”
“Why?” Nick asks. “We already saw the tree. Is there something we didn’t see?”
“It’s just what you should do. The girls who lived here, they ran up to this room after what happened to them in the basement. Then they jumped from these windows into the tree. So now that you’ve checked out this room, you should go look at the tree next. And then you can go downstairs.”
“Uck,” Gloria says, flaring her arms out to her sides. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why are we listening to creepy pajama girl anyway?” She flounces out of the room. Nick shakes his head and turns to follow her. The other two kids make their way down the hall after them.
“Well, congratulations,” Larry says to Kara. “You’ve ruined our fun for the night. But maybe we can still have a little.”
“I wasn’t trying to ruin anything. If you guys want to scare Gloria, it makes no difference to me.” Kara says this as she steps in front of Larry to leave the room. She’s hoping to get to the ground floor before the rest of them so she can direct them all outside somehow. “But I’m telling you, check out the tree. It’s probably better than whatever’s in the basement.”
Larry lifts his hand. He leaves his fingers unclenched and barely touches her shoulder, but his arm makes a barrier she would have to push past. “What’s out by the tree, Kara?”
Cornered, Kara looks to the door and then back toward the windows. Maybe she could jump out, like she imagined doing earlier, and they’d chase her out of the house. But just then Gloria’s voice reverberates down the hall. “Hey, Larry, come on. We need the flashlight.”
As frightened and desperate as Kara is, the thrill of Gloria’s own failure of courage breaks through.
“I’m coming,” he yells, before turning back to Kara. “Let’s go pajama girl.”
She walks to the door and turns back. Larry gestures for her to continue down the hall. He follows close behind her until they reach the stairwell, where he steps around and squeezes past the other kids to light the way down. When he reaches the landing on the ground floor, he turns around and shines the flashlight in Kara’s face. “You know what?” he says. “Let’s get her out of here. Seth, would you make sure she gets on her bike? We’re going to take Gloria down to the basement, and then we’ll see if there’s really anything out by the tree.”
Kara tries to look past Larry to the basement, wondering if Crystal has heard. Is she really in danger? If they get mad enough, will they hurt her? Kara decides she won’t take that risk. There’s no way Crystal would let them harm her, so she can’t even give them the chance to harm Crystal. Larry shining the light in her eyes infuriates her—and gives her an idea. Before she has a chance to envision it through to the end, she’s putting her plan into action. Roughly jostling past Gloria and Nick, she springs down the stairs and snatches the flashlight out of Larry’s hand. Enraged voices fill the house as Kara bolts toward the door. Already she knows she’s made a calamitous mistake. There won’t be time to pull back the board covering the doorway. Sure enough, as she slows to reach for the edge, a body crashes against her, enormous, its powerful arms wrapping around her shoulders and chest. Larry has her.
“Nice try you little bitch.”
One of his hands works its way down her arm and pries the flashlight out of her hand. With one side free, she turns to see the other four kids rushing into the living room. She’s done it. But how can she let Crystal know? She lifts her right foot to stomp on the floorboards, but Larry whips her around by her other arm, sending her down on all fours.
Nick steps forward. “You got the flashlight. Just let her go home man.”
Kara twists to see Larry’s chest heaving. He’s gripping the flashlight in his right hand. His left is squeezed into a fist.
“I can’t wait to get to school tomorrow,” he says with a clenched jaw, “so we can tell everyone how we found creepy pajama girl here playing with herself in the creepiest place in town.”
Kara, convinced he’s about to kick her or jump on top of her, turns and crabwalks toward the wall. “Get away from me! Or I’ll tell everyone how you were trying to scare Gloria away so you could have your boyfriend Nick all to yourself.”
The words come out of her mouth, but all she grasps of their meaning is that they’re insulting. Seth and the other girl explode with laughter. Larry steps toward her, raising his right hand over his head, the hand with the flashlight. Kara notices two things simultaneously: Nick pushing on Gloria’s shoulder so he can step around her to intercept Larry, and Larry halting mid-lunge, catching himself. She knows instantly that she and her sister are in no real danger—no physical danger anyway. But before she can adjust to this assurance, a full-throated shriek fills the room.
In the half second it takes Kara to guess it’s her sister screaming, she releases a squirt of pee. She brings her knees together and scrambles to her feet, not wanting anyone to see a wet spot. Startled shouts and whimpers reach her ears, but she doesn’t see whose mouths they come from. Now come footsteps resounding angrily as they storm up the stairs from the basement. Larry manages to direct the light onto the landing just as a blood-slicked mass dashes across the framed doorway. More whimpers and screams echo through the bare room as everyone backs away from the stairwell—everyone but Kara, who steps forward. Was that Crystal? If it wasn’t, whatever it was must’ve hurt her. Hurt her bad.
The kids all stand frozen in silence as the stomping reaches the top of the stairs and continues down the hall. Kara looks at the faces surrounding her, all the flashing eyes pointing up at the ceiling, and she thinks now is the time to hurry away and find her sister. But her feet are stuck in place.
They hear a tinkling crunch, glass breaking. Then they hear the clacking and crackling of branches, someone leaping into the tree from the window, followed by the sickening thud of a heavy weight landing on the ground in front of the house. Kara is the first at the window, the first to see the obscene mess of a body lying a short distance from the base of the tree. Her mouth falls open to release a sound between a retch and a grunt. Bodies are churning all around her as the light jumps and swings erratically. She doesn’t look at the others. They’re speaking, shouting. She doesn’t hear the words. She hears creaking and snapping as hands grip the board covering the front entrance by the edges to work it free of the nails. Finally, she turns, desperate to get to her sister, if that is her sister, and pursues the others onto the porch. The second her foot crosses the threshold she hears the bone rattle of clattering branches high in the tree again. They all rush out to see a second blood-spattered body suspended over them. Only this one is still moving. This one, human in shape, is working its way toward the thicker branches closer to the trunk. Then it stops, turns to face the cluster of crazed kids, thrusts its head forward and catapults its banshee roar at their quivering silhouettes. Kara stands paralyzed on the porch as the bodies around her scatter and retreat across the lawn.
The older kids are already running alongside and springing onto their bikes when the blood-drenched girl in the tree starts climbing down. Kara backs her way under the eaves, eying her own bike. She’s completely alone now to face whatever this is. But she won’t leave Crystal. She can’t. Her gaze drops from the tree to the lump on the ground. She turns and looks into the black of the gaping doorway. Should she rush downstairs first? Or go examine whatever that is that fell out of the tree? How can she with the demented ape still in the branches?
Or is that Crystal up there? Kara steps forward again and leans down to look up from under the eaves. “Crystal?” she murmurs, too quiet to be heard. “Crystal,” she says louder, “is that you?”
Laughter, Crystal’s laughter, rings out. Then scraping, snapping, an inrush of air through familiar teeth, a breathy grunt, all mingle in a desperate moment, forcing Kara to smash her eyelids together and hold her breath. She hears the sickening collision with the ground as two hollow beats in rapid succession—feet then upper body.
“Crystal!” she shouts, leaping over the steps.
A hiss, a growl, more laughter—Kara still can’t tell if she’s running toward the demon who will slash, maul, and dismember her. She runs nonetheless. And she sees it really is Crystal. And she really is covered in blood, or something that looks like blood.
“Are you hurt?”
“I hurt my damn foot!”
“But you’re bleeding all over. You’re covered in blood.”
“It’s not my blood. It’s his.” She points to the mass that fell from the tree.
Kara turns and stares. “What is it? Oh God, it smells.”
“It’s a goat. Those sick jerks cut it up, pulled its skin back to make it look gross and scary. They had it lying in the middle of a pentagram to make it look like someone sacrificed it to the devil.”
“They killed a goat?”
“Who knows if they’re the ones that killed it? But they must’ve been the ones who carved it up.” Crystal, wincing, rocks on her butt as she squeezes her foot with both hands. “I think it’s broken.”
“Crystal,” Kara says tearing up, “you’ve got that goat’s blood all over you.”
“I know damn it!”
Kara backs away. How can she know this really isn’t a demon, one disguised as her sister? How can she know her sister isn’t possessed?
“I’m sorry,” Crystal says. “This really hurts. I didn’t want to let the body and all the blood scare me. When I saw it, I screamed, and then I went and looked closer. I didn’t understand why it was there, why it was really there, until I heard those idiots talking. Then I figured it out. And I got mad. So I decided to scare the hell out of them. And I didn’t think they’d be scared of me in my pajamas. They were already teasing you about yours. I still wasn’t sure I could do it, but then I heard them getting rough with you. You know I’d never let them hurt you.”
“They wouldn’t have hurt me, I don’t think.”
“Tell that to him.” She points at the flayed goat.
Kara finally goes up to her sister to help her to her feet. “Do you think you can pedal your bike?”
“I don’t have much choice, do I?”
Kara grabs Crystal’s wrist, ducks under her arm, and holds her up as she pogoes toward her bike.
“My pajamas have blood on them now too. I think I might get sick.”
“We’ll have to throw them away when we get home. Don’t worry about that now. Let’s just get out of here before they figure out what I did and come back.”
“How do you know it was them who killed the goat and drew the devil symbol?”
“Well, they seemed pretty damn eager to scare Gloria, don’t you think? And they were pretty damn mad at you just for being here and messing up their plan.”
“You carried that thing all the way upstairs and threw it out the window?”
“First, I threw it across the landing. Did you see that? It wasn’t easy. It’s heavy as hell.”
“I can’t believe you did that.”
As they round the corner of the porch to where Crystal leaned her bike earlier, Kara has a thought. “Hey, I think I want to go down in that basement too. I would’ve been way too scared to do what you did, but I think I need to conquer my fear, like you said. Or else I’ll get old and never get what I want and see horrible stuff along the way.”
Crystal pulls her arm away and turns to face Kara, clasping her by the shoulders, using her for balance. “Listen to me.” They’re close enough for Kara to see the fire in her sister’s eyes. “We’re done with this place. Do you understand? I want you to promise me you’ll never come back here, alone or with anyone else.”
Kara stares into her sister’s transformed face.
“Promise me!”
“Okay! I promise! But, Crystal, why can’t we come back? You said it was all made up.”
Crystal releases her, takes two hops toward her bike, and then turns back. “Kara, I was standing there in the dark with that thing for a long time. I almost couldn’t stand it. I was shaking. I heard those boys talking, and that ditz Gloria, and I made my plan. But right after I heard the scuffle by the door above me, right before I just said to hell with it and picked the damn thing up, I heard something. I heard it clear as day.”
“What, Crystal? What did you hear?”
“I heard a little girl crying. And then I heard another little girl saying, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll never let him hurt you again.’”
***
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