by Josh Allen
“Vanishers” was originally published in
Cricket magazine in October 2016.
“Vanishers” text copyright © 2016, 2019 by Josh Allen
All other text copyright © 2019 by Josh Allen
Illustrations copyright © 2019 by Sarah J. Coleman
All Rights Reserved
HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
www.holidayhouse.com
The illustrations were created with pencil, pen, and ink on A3 cartridge paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Allen, Josh, author. | Coleman, Sarah J., illustrator.
Title: Out to get you : 13 tales of weirdness and woe / by Josh Allen; illustrated by Sarah J. Coleman.
Description: First edition. | New York : Holiday House, [2019]
Summary: A collection of thirteen short stories that reveal scary secrets lurking in everyday objects.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018060602 | ISBN 9780823443666 (hardback)
Subjects: LCSH: Horror tales, American. | Children’s stories, American.
CYAC: Horror stories. | Short stories. | BISAC: JUVENILE FICTION
Horror & Ghost Stories. | JUVENILE FICTION / Short Stories.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.A4387 Ou 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018060602
Ebook ISBN 9780823443949
v5.4
a
DEDICATED TO
CARTER, TAYLOR,
MALLORY, AND WYATT.
AND TO SUZY.
ALWAYS.
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
VANISHERS
NINE LIVES
THE STAIN ON THE CAFETERIA FLOOR
WHEN DAUNTE VANISHED, THEY SAID HE MOVED TO OHIO
THE COLOR OF IVY
NEAT-O BURRITO
CROSSING
THE VOICE
GOODBYE, RIDGECREST MIDDLE SCHOOL
MIGHTY COMFY
SORRY, FROGGY
STARING CONTEST
THE SHADOW CURSE
THEY were best friends named Jacob and Jakob, and they lived next door to each other. Over the years, they’d built snow forts together and leaped off backyard sheds together, and one summer, they’d even broken their left wrists together in a freak trampoline accident.
At the end of fifth grade, they’d developed crushes on the same girl together—Bethany Miller, a black-haired beauty who could pitch a baseball so fast not even the eighth-grade boys could hit it. Neither of the boys did a thing about his crush, though, because neither was willing to risk losing their friendship—not even for Bethany Miller.
Jacob with a C. Jakob with a K. That’s what people called them. Since they even looked alike—each had the same shaggy haircut, the same lanky walk, the same light freckles—if you wanted one of them, you just called out, “Hey, Jakob with a K,” and waited to see which boy looked up.
“You need more friends,” their parents sometimes told them. “This is getting weird.”
But why, Jacob thought, should he make more friends when he had Jakob? And why, Jakob thought, should he make more friends with Jacob around?
One late October afternoon, when the last bell had rung and another day of sixth grade was finally over, Jacob and Jakob met by the large maple tree to begin the walk home. They set out slowly, ambling along as clouds whirled and a light wind blew.
“Balotobob?” Jacob asked. The boys had their own language. They’d decided they needed one when a note they’d been passing in Social Studies last year had been confiscated and read aloud. Balotobob? meant How are you?
“Blapo,” Jakob replied. Good. “Except I have to write a story for Ms. Jenkins’s class tonight. A whole story with characters and a plot and everything.”
The wind picked up, and they zipped their jackets against the chill.
“You hate writing,” Jacob said. “If you want, I’ll help you.”
“Skolototh!” Awesome!
At the edge of the schoolyard, they pressed the button to cross Westover Street, and a streak of lightning flashed in the distance. A storm was coming.
“Well,” Jacob said. “What does your story have to be about?”
“It can be about anything. But it has to be at least three full pages.”
“You could make it a creepy story.”
“A creepy story?” Jakob said. “You mean, like, with a monster?”
“Chellitarb,” Jacob said. Totally. As he said this, the clouds thickened and swirled, and the afternoon’s colors faded. Even the boys’ faces paled in the changing light, taking on the faint yellow tint of old newspapers.
“That could work.” Jakob nodded. “That could be cool.” Cars waited as the boys crossed the street and stepped onto a leaf-covered sidewalk. Dried leaves crunched under their feet. “I watched a TV show last night about zombies. I could write about zombies.”
Jacob let out a little puff of air. “No way!” he said. “Anything but zombies. They used to be creepy, like, a long time ago, but they’re, like, all over the place now. There are zombie movies and zombie video games. There’s even a zombie emoji.” Jacob pulled out his phone, swiped a few times, and showed Jakob the green-gray zombie face on the screen. “Last week my mom bought some Halloween cereal, and it had zombie-head marshmallows in it.”
“Yeah,” Jakob agreed. “I guess you’re right.”
“You should make up a new kind of monster,” Jacob said. In the distance lightning flashed, and the boys stopped to count for the thunder. After three seconds, it rumbled.
“A new kind of monster?” Jakob said. “Like what?”
Jacob stroked his chin, the way people did in movies when they were thinking. The boys rounded the corner and passed Nielsen’s Drugstore. A faded sign in the window showed a smiling woman holding a yellow bottle of laundry detergent. Across the top the sign said, SPOT-B-GONE MAKES STAINS VANISH!
“Makes stains vanish,” Jacob said, and pointed. “You could call your monsters the Vanishers.”
“The Vanishers?” The wind hissed. Dried leaves skittered along the sidewalk. “What are Vanishers?”
“I’m not sure yet,” said Jacob.
The boys turned off the main road and into their neighborhood. They walked quietly for a minute.
“These Vanishers are creepy though, right?” Jakob said. It was growing cold, and the boys shoved their hands into their pockets.
“Oh, they’re plenty creepy. They’re klotman creepy.” Klotman meant something so strange and weird as to be almost unreal. “Just you wait.”
They rounded another corner and walked in silence for a few minutes more.
“I’ve got it,” Jacob said. “I know what Vanishers do.”
“Let me guess,” Jakob said. “They kill you. That’s what all monsters do. Kill you.”
“Not Vanishers,” said Jacob. “Vanishers are different. They aren’t murderers. Not really. They don’t kill you. Instead, what they do is, they vanish you.”
The clouds grew darker and thicker still, and by now the boys’ faces appeared faint and ghostly.
“Vanishers wipe you out,” Jacob said. “They erase you, like off a chalkboard. If the Vanishers set out to get you, they just get you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You’ll be walking down the street one day, and all at once they’ll zero in on you, and you’ll get strange and milky, like a crystal ball. And then, little by lit
tle, you’ll just fade away.”
The first drops of rain fell. The boys paused to put their hoods up, and they cinched the strings tight around their faces.
“So you just disappear one day? And your parents and everyone have to wonder what happened to you?” Jakob said. “Like they do when someone goes missing on TV?” Jakob’s voice came out soft and muffled through his hood and the wind and the rain. “That’s a little scary, I guess, but it’s not that scary. It’s mostly sad.”
“Well, it’s worse than that,” said Jacob. The boys walked with their heads down, braced against the weather. They turned onto their street. “Because when the Vanishers get you, you don’t disappear from right now. You disappear from forever. Your birthdays. Your learning to walk. Everything. It’s like none of it ever happened. No one remembers any of it. No one remembers you. You’re vanished. You’re erased. From everywhere.”
A gust of wind bent the trees along the sidewalk.
The boys’ homes came into view. Jacob’s mother was out front in a long black coat, dragging a brown garbage bin in from the curb despite the wind and rain.
“Can you fight the Vanishers?” Jakob asked. “Can you outrun them?”
“No way!” Jacob hunched his shoulders as he reached his driveway, where he’d peel off and Jakob would keep going for one more house. “Vanishers don’t even have bodies. They just exist, like, everywhere at once. In the light and the air and everywhere.” He waved one hand in the damp air around him. “When they decide to get you, you’re just gone. There’s nothing you can do.”
His mother pulled the garbage bin into the open garage. The bin rattled and slid. She looked up, rainwater dripping down her face.
“Who are you talking to?” she said.
Jacob pointed to his side. “I’m talking to…”
He stopped. He’d been telling a story, hadn’t he? To someone? Talking about the Vanishers? The air around him felt heavy and cold, and he shivered. He turned in a full circle.
No one was there.
He looked to the gray brick house next door. There was a name he tried to call to mind. It had something to do with the letter K.
Kevin? Kacey? Kyle?
He shook his head.
“No one,” he said. “I guess I was just talking to myself.”
LET me tell you something. There’s a huge difference between cats and kittens. I noticed it years ago, back when I was still in pigtails and training wheels.
To start, kittens are way cuter. Their bodies haven’t really grown to match the size of their heads, so they have these huge faces. I know that sounds weird, but trust me, it’s super-adorable. And it gives kittens these big look-at-me eyes.
Plus, kittens will sit in your lap and let you pet them. At least Licorice always did. Licorice was the kitten Mom got me for my seventh birthday. He was covered in black fur—his face, his back, his legs—all black. That’s why I named him Licorice.
Another thing that makes kittens so much better than cats is that kittens are unbelievably soft—their ears especially. I used to sit with Licorice in front of the TV and just fondle his velvety ears between my fingers and thumb. I could have done that all day. And Licorice would have let me, too. But cats are nothing like kittens. Nothing.
Cats, if you want to know the truth, are kind of the worst. Take Licorice. Once he grew up, he totally changed. He got big and kind of snobby, and he didn’t want to sit in my lap anymore. He would, for a second, if I hoisted him up and made him, but once I got settled, he’d wriggle, jump off my lap, and prowl around the hallway instead.
That’s what Licorice spent most of his time doing—prowling. Around the house, the yard, the neighborhood.
Once he became a cat, it was like he didn’t care that I existed anymore.
And that wasn’t even the worst thing about Licorice.
The worst thing was that he never learned to use the litter box. I could forgive that in Licorice the Kitten. I mean, if a cute kitten piddles on the floor once in a while and you have to clean it up, well, okay. But when Licorice the Full-Grown Cat did it, it felt different.
I guess Licorice tried. I mean, he actually did his business standing in the litter box. The problem was that his back end would always dangle over the edge, and the mess would plop down on the kitchen floor.
It drove Mom nuts. She’d come in from the garage holding a bag of groceries and see a pile of…well…you know, on her newly mopped kitchen floor, and she’d kind of lose it.
“Licorice!” she’d say. “Licorice! Oh, why do we even have a stupid cat?” Then she’d track down Licorice, drag him over to the pile, and say, “No, Licorice! No!”
I think she was trying to train him, like a dog.
It went on like this for years, and each time Licorice defiled the floor, Mom seemed to grow less patient.
“Cats are the worst,” she said once while she mopped up a puddle.
“When Licorice dies, we’re never getting another cat,” she said another time. “Never.”
And then one day she said, “I hate that cat.” And I think she meant it. I really do.
A few weeks later, she walked into the kitchen one morning, still groggy-eyed and barefoot, and she stepped right into Licorice’s latest delivery.
Squish!
“Licorice!” she said, and I could tell from her voice—how loud and high-pitched it was—that something in her had snapped.
She hopped over to Licorice on one foot, since her other foot was covered in you-know-what. She grabbed Licorice by the fur on the back of his neck and lifted him up. He didn’t even squirm. He just hung there.
“Miranda, get my keys!” Mom called, still hopping on one foot. “And get in the car!”
Her face turned bright red, and she was shaking the way she does when I go a week without cleaning my room.
I grabbed her keys off the hook by the door and buckled into the passenger seat while Mom flung Licorice into the back of the car. He jumped up onto the back seat and started prowling around.
Mom backed out of the driveway.
“Three miles,” she said under her breath. “That should be enough.”
A hot hole opened up inside me. “Um, Mom,” I said, but Mom raised one finger and shushed me.
She turned left onto Birch Bark Drive and made a right onto Harrison. She drove for a while, zipping around corners, and sometimes, out of the blue, she’d flip a U-turn and head in the opposite direction. I think she was trying to confuse Licorice, to get him good and lost.
Finally she pulled over at a farmer’s cornfield.
She jumped out, not even bothering to turn off the car, and she swung open the back door.
I knew what Mom was going to do, but I didn’t say anything. The hot hole in my chest opened up even further, and to tell you the truth, I was kind of thinking about how cats aren’t kittens.
“Out!” Mom said, but Licorice just looked at her with his yellow-green eyes.
“Cat!” she said, not using Licorice’s name. “Get out!” Again, Licorice just stared, so Mom leaned in and grabbed him. Then she tossed him toward the cornstalks. He twisted in the air and landed on his feet. Of course.
Licorice looked up. He took about two steps toward the car, but Mom said, “No!” Licorice froze. I rolled down the window.
Was Mom really going to do this?
At the side of the road, Mom waved her arms.
“Shoo!” she said. “Scat! Scram!” Then she got back in the car and slammed the door.
I opened my mouth, but Mom looked at me and said, “Not now, Miranda.” So I closed it.
That’s when the hot hole in my chest really started to burn. I began sweating a little, but still, I didn’t say anything.
Maybe I should have.
Before I could think about it, Mom drove off. Behind us, Licorice stood by th
e side of the road. He tilted his head to one side, but he didn’t run after us.
“Well,” Mom said. “I’m glad that’s over with.”
She switched on the radio, but she must have noticed my face because she said, “Don’t worry, Miranda.” And then she said, “Licorice will be fine. Cats have nine lives.”
I didn’t answer her.
I didn’t even speak.
* * *
When we pulled into the driveway, believe it or not, there was a cat sitting on our front porch—a stray.
It was an orange cat. It was whisper thin and had a notch in its ear, and its fur was so sparse on one side you could see pale skin underneath.
“Not another one.” Mom pointed at me. “Get rid of it, Miranda.”
I got out of the car and walked to the porch. Mom went inside, and I waved my arms at the cat, like Mom had at Licorice.
“Shoo,” I said, but I didn’t scream it. I couldn’t. I was thinking about Licorice at the side of the road, so I only whispered.
“Scat,” I said, but the word barely came out.
The orange cat didn’t move. It tilted its head to one side. I stomped my foot against the sidewalk. I clapped my hands, but the cat stayed put. That was when I noticed it was missing an eye—its left one. The skin around where the eye should have been was pink and raw-looking, like the eye had only been gone a few days.
That orange cat just stood there on my porch—not moving, not leaving. It stared at me with its one good eye.
Get out of here, I tried to say but couldn’t.
I don’t know how long I stood there, getting stared down by a one-eyed cat. Maybe a few minutes. But I needed to get ready for school, so finally I stepped over the cat and went inside.
Half an hour later, when I opened the door carrying my lunch and my backpack, the cat was there, in the exact same place on our porch. It sat statue-still, like its one eye hadn’t even blinked.
And there was something else. Something worse.
The one-eyed cat wasn’t alone anymore.
It’d been joined by two more cats. They were just as thin, and they looked just as roughed-up. One of them had only three legs. The other had only half a tail. They looked at me together, and my neck hairs prickled.