by Ronald Malfi
No one noticed Warren Enck.
The mask was protecting him, just as Mr. Trueheart had promised, though whether it was actually hiding him from the horde, much in the way an invisibility cloak might work, or if it merely made him blend in with the rest of them, Warren didn’t know. Maybe it didn’t matter.
Someone blew a whistle. The costumed children grew quiet and listened to instruction from a large woman wearing bunny ears. They would march down Windell and through the town, trick-or-treating. The costumed children—the replacements—cheered. A few parents snapped photos and the baby continued to cry.
Warren clambered down the bleachers and crept behind the hedgerow unnoticed. Crouching down, he brushed the dead leaves from the Maxwell House contraption—
(the bomb)
—and slid his hand around the base of it until his small fingers found the toggle switch. He did not hesitate to switch it into the “up” position. Despite Mr. Trueheart’s assurance, Warren held his breath, anticipating the Christmas light to wink on and give away his location. But it didn’t. Relief washed over him.
Three minutes, he thought, crawling out from beneath the hedgerow. He could make it to the street with no problem, but he wouldn’t go home. He wanted to watch the bomb go off, wanted to see the replacements, the monsters, die in the blast. With the mask on, he felt certain he would see their true selves as they writhed and died in the fire.
Warren ran across the park toward Windell Street. Street lamps blinked on in the dark, as if to illuminate his approach. Cars swooshed by, their headlights overly bright. There was a bench at the corner of the block, directly beneath a BUS STOP sign. Warren sat, readjusted his mask so that he could see better through the eye holes, and waited for the explosion.
He wore no wristwatch, but counted out the seconds, the minutes, in a low whisper. Three minutes. Many of the costumed children in the park had flashlights, and they switched them on now—dozens of bright little diodes fireflying in the darkness. They began to march toward Windell.
Warren counted out all three minutes.
Waited.
Nothing happened.
Recognizing that he could have been off by a few seconds, he waited, his palms sweating on the knees of his cargo pants, his sour breath filling the rubber mask. He could feel droplets of perspiration trickling down his temples, his forehead, his cheeks. His respiration sounded like an asthmatic’s wheeze.
And still—nothing happened.
The queue of children—
(replacements)
—spilled out onto Windell, led by the large woman in rabbit ears. Parents followed. No explosion detonated by the baseball diamond. The world was unnaturally silent.
Warren watched the parade stomp by him. He took note of each costumed doppelganger, how they moved so convincingly like children, how their shrill voices sounded no different than they had a year ago. They were good at masking themselves and blending in. Mr. Trueheart had warned Warren that they would be.
After the parade had moved on down Windell and vacated the park altogether, Warren got up from the bench. Hesitantly, he crossed the field and approached the baseball diamond. Beneath the moonlight, the bleachers looked shiny and polished. The pitcher’s mound was like a ghostly white humpback rising out of the earth.
Warren crawled through the hedgerow and stared down at Mr. Trueheart’s bomb. He stared at it for a long, long time. He counted out 180 seconds, mumbling the numbers inside the mask, and still the bomb did not go off.
Summoning some courage, he flicked a finger against the side of the coffee can. It made a hollow dong sound. He lifted the whole contraption and shook it gingerly. Nothing rattled around inside. When he finally decided to pry the can off the wooden board, a part of him felt like a traitor to Mr. Trueheart. He also worried that the thing might blow up in his face.
But it didn’t blow up; it came away from the board with little resistance, having only been tacked down with small, thin nails. Warren peeled the can off the board completely, the spools of wires pulling taut—Warren held his breath—and then he tipped the can upside down and peered inside.
It was empty.
The wires had been soldered to the interior of the can, but they weren’t attached to anything. Similarly, the Christmas bulb poking from the base of the can was connected to nothing: it was simply held in place by two pieces of masking tape. The toggle switch was constructed in a similar fashion, having been pushed through a hole in the can but held in place by several bands of tape. There were no wires connected to anything. It was just a tin can nailed to a board.
Warren shoved the contraption further under the bushes then stood up. He remained standing there for some time, uncertain as to what this all meant and wondering what his next move should be.
“Phase Two,” he muttered to himself eventually, recalling that Mr. Trueheart would be in the process of Phase Two at his house right now. Whatever Phase Two was...
* * *
I was overseas the first time I noticed something was off. We grabbed someone from the nearby village—someone whom I had been spying on, keeping tabs on, someone I recognized wasn’t quite right—and we tied them up in a shed. Even when he cried and begged and screamed, I knew it was all a facade. Do you know what a facade is, Warren? It’s a mask, just like the kind children wear on Halloween. This monster was wearing a mask, Warren, a human mask, but he hadn’t fooled me. He hadn’t fooled any of us.
Do you know what we did?
Warren does not.
We removed the mask, Warren. We cut it right off him and exposed him for exactly what he was. And that’s when I was convinced. They are among us but they can’t hide, not if we’re vigilant and pay attention and have no fear. Do you have any fear, Warren?
Warren shakes his head.
Good, says Mr. Trueheart. I didn’t think you did. That’s good. Because we’ve got a mission, you and me. Something we need to do.
Warren asks what that is.
To save the world, Warren. To save the world.
* * *
He had to muster up some courage to mount the porch steps and knock on Mr. Trueheart’s door. This wasn’t one of their scheduled meetings and he’d never stopped by Mr. Trueheart’s house unannounced before.
There were no footsteps on the other side of the door.
Warren knocked again.
He was perspiring like mad beneath the mask, but he felt calm inside it, protected, and he didn’t want to take it off.
Warren waited, but there were no footsteps. No Mr. Trueheart. He began to worry, and wondered if something terrible had befallen his friend. Had the replacements caught on to their plan? Did that explain why their homemade bomb was nothing but a hollow shell? Had they gotten into Mr. Trueheart’s house without him knowing?
This last thought sent a chill down Warren’s spine. All species of terrible thoughts filled his mind. What, exactly, were the replacements capable of? Mr. Trueheart said they were terrible creatures that paraded as people, but what exactly made them so terrible?
For the first time, Warren’s confusion bordered on self-doubt.
He reached out and turned the doorknob. Pushed. Mr. Trueheart’s door eased open with a squeal.
The smell of tomato soup struck him as he stepped inside, just as it always did...but now, there was something else. Something more rank.
It smells like a toilet, Warren realized as he walked slowly into the house.
“Mr. Trueheart,” he called.
Paused.
No answer.
He peered into the darkened rooms as he passed by them on his way down the hall. They were all empty. He glanced into the kitchen and saw the cone of paper still rolled up on the kitchen table. Warren’s empty drinking glass still stood at the edge of the table. Nothing looked unusual or out of place.
“Mr. Trueheart? Are you here?”
Mr. Trueheart was here: Warren found him in the foxhole, right in the center of the floor, in the spot where the
Maxwell House bomb—
(not a bomb)
—had been earlier. He was sprawled out on the carpet, his body strangely crumpled. The smell of feces was stronger here. There was something on the floor near Mr. Trueheart’s right hand. There was something on the carpet by his head, too. Warren crept closer for better inspection. The item beside Mr. Trueheart’s right hand was a gun. The something by Mr. Trueheart’s head was actually a puddle of blood, so dark in the poor lighting of the foxhole that it looked as black as velvet.
Warren stood over Mr. Trueheart and looked down at him. He was startled to find Mr. Trueheart’s eyes still open, though there was an absence in them, something missing. There was also a small dime-sized hole at his temple from which two delicate streamers of blood issued. There were hunks of matter in the blood and on the carpet and, Warren noticed when he looked up, along the cushions of the nearby loveseat, too. Some of the chunks had Mr. Trueheart’s hair stuck to them. Warren was suddenly grateful that Mr. Trueheart was facing the ceiling, for he feared the opening at the back of his friend’s head was much larger and messier than the one at his temple.
Warren stared down at his friend’s body for some time. He didn’t count the seconds, the minutes, so he would never be sure how long he stood there, sweating inside that mask. Then, after a while, he adjourned to the kitchen, where he located the bottle of liquor on the counter—the bottle with the bright red turkey on it. He saw that there was only a little bit left in it.
Warren peeled the rubber mask up over his face, luxuriating in the way the sweat on his face grew instantly chilly in the air. He gathered up the bottle in two hands and brought the spout to his mouth. When the liquor hit his throat, he gagged and dropped the bottle on the floor. He thought he might throw up, and dropped to his knees, coughing.
After the feeling passed and he didn’t throw up, he swiped tears from his eyes and, using one of the kitchen chairs for support, climbed unsteadily to his feet.
Before leaving the house, Warren peered back into the foxhole, though he didn’t dare go down there again.
“I’m sorry,” he called out to Mr. Trueheart’s body. “I’m sorry they got you. We should have done something sooner.”
In the foyer, Warren pulled the mask back down over his face and slipped out into the night.
* * *
He screamed when we cut his face off, Warren. But underneath! Oh, Warren, there was no hiding what that monster truly was! And we made him suffer. Yes we did, son. Yes we did.
* * *
It was late by the time Warren arrived home. The TV was still on in the living room, but his mother was passed out on the couch and snoring like a locomotive. Laddie was in her lap; his tiny black head popped up as Warren approached and, possibly because the dog did not recognize Warren in the mask, or possibly because he simply did not like or trust Warren, he began yipping shrilly.
“Quiet,” Warren said. He went to the couch and snatched the dog up off his mother’s lap. His mother didn’t even stir.
Warren went through the kitchen and to the basement door. He opened the door and released Laddie onto the first step. The dog barked once then went silent. Warren closed the door on him. He locked it, too, even though Laddie could not use a doorknob. That was just silly.
Back in the living room, his silhouette silvered from the glow of the television, Warren stood for a long time above his mother as she snored on the couch. The longer he stared down at her, the more he could see the innate ugliness of her, the sheer wrongness of her. That angular face...the glistening trail of drool that purled from her open mouth...her meaty leg tented up from the part in her robe, the hue of unbaked dough...
“You can’t fool me,” Warren said, his voice muffled from within the mask. “You can’t fool me.”
But underneath! Oh, Warren, there was no hiding what that monster truly was!
He went into the kitchen for a knife.
The House on Cottage Lane
The Toomeys, who lived in the house next door, were always taking in weirdoes. My father repeatedly scolded me about using such a word, but that was the truth of it: the kids were weird. There had been the boy who sat in the yard all day trying on different women’s hats, which he carried around with him in an old brown shopping bag from the A&P. There had been a girl of seven or eight who never came out of the house, though she would keep her pale white ghost-face pressed against one of the upstairs dormer windows, staring out at Luther Avenue with melancholia in her eyes, reminding me of fairytales about princesses held captive in stone towers. Last summer, the Toomeys brought home a girl of about eleven or twelve—my age—who seemed normal enough at first. She even came over to play a few times, and we would either go out into the yard and dig up larval ant-lions or play badminton (we have a net) or we would just stay inside and watch TV. But then one afternoon, while we were out digging in the yard for nightcrawlers, she bit me high up on my bicep for no reason. It was hard enough to draw blood. After that, my father said I didn’t have to play with her anymore. When I asked him why she had done such a thing, my father’s face grew dark, as if clouds were passing overhead, and he said, “Not all kids in this world are as lucky as you, Brian.” He seemed saddened by my delight at not having to bother with the girl anymore. When she was finally sent off to some other foster home—or to wherever kids like her go—I was pleased.
The kids were weirdoes, all right, but that meant that the Toomeys were even weirder. What sort of couple brought kids like that into their home? I couldn’t understand it. Jeremy Beachy’s mom was constantly threatening to send Jeremy, her own flesh and blood, off to boarding school, yet Eric and June Toomey continued to take these strange kids into their home and pretend, at least for a little while, to be their parents. The Toomeys had no kids of their own, so I assumed this was their way of faking it. It was like an assembly-line: when one weirdo left, another one would show up. Over the years, I had lost count as to how many had come to stay at the Toomey house. My mother seemed to regard the Toomeys with an air of suspicion, but my father said they were good people and that they were doing a very good thing helping all those troubled kids. To me, they were weirdoes; to my dad, they were always “troubled kids.” I failed to see the difference.
Their newest kid arrived two months ago. He was short and thin for a boy, and I originally guessed him to be a year or two younger than me. Turned out, he was exactly my age, and it wasn’t long before my father started in with his not-so-subtle hints that I make an effort to befriend the kid. One afternoon, I went over to the Toomeys’ house with a stack of comic books tucked under one arm. June Toomey’s face lit up when she opened the front door to find me standing there. She quickly ushered me inside, and introduced me to the new kid. His name was Oliver, and he possessed the big face and widely spaced teeth of a jack-o’-lantern. Despite his slight frame, his clothes seemed too small. A large booger waved in and out of one nostril in rhythm with his respiration, like the hinged valve on a pipe. I asked him if he liked comic books and he just rolled those bony little shoulders of his. His shyness that afternoon would have driven me mad had I not decided to spread out on the Toomeys’ living-room floor and read my books while Oliver, sitting Indian-style on the couch across the room, did nothing but stare out the windows.
At my father’s behest, I ventured over to the Toomeys’ on a few more occasions. Sometimes I brought my comic books, other times I took over my video game console, which Eric Toomey gladly hooked up to their TV, a smile on his face so stretched out of proportion that it looked like he was trying to hide something. Oliver sometimes played the video games with me, but he was so awful that it took much of the pleasure from it. Like pack animals, kids know when they’re in the presence of a weaker member, and that was certainly the case with Oliver. I could sense his passivity like a stink coming off his flesh. In turn, I think my awareness of our hierarchy drove him into greater submission. I wasn’t mean to him, wasn’t a bully, but I couldn’t help bark at him aggressively on
the occasions when his timidity pushed me over the edge.
A week before Halloween, as I was about to sprint out the door to meet up with Jeremy Beachy and Cyn Cristo to play baseball in the park, my father suggested I see if Oliver wanted to join me. So I went next door, was greeted by June Toomey’s strangely shocked smile, and ultimately asked Oliver if he wanted to come along. To my surprise and dismay, Oliver agreed to come. He didn’t have a glove, so I ran back home and grabbed my old one for him.
At Shoulder Park, I introduced Oliver to Jeremy and Cyn, my best friends, while Oliver stared at his sneakers. Cyn said, “Hello,” and spent the rest of the afternoon watching the strange new kid from the corner of her eye. Less understated than Cyn, Jeremy fired a barrage of questions at the boy—where did he come from? What happened to his parents (and were they dead)? Did he go to school? Had he seen June Toomey naked coming out of the shower?
Oliver’s baseball skills made him look like a videogame wizard. He couldn’t catch, couldn’t hit, and he ran with the hobbled gait of someone learning to walk again after a markedly bad automobile accident. Jeremy was relentless in his torment, and never missed an opportunity to criticize. Cyn said nothing, but continued to stare at Oliver as if expecting, at any moment, his head to pop right off the skinny stalk of his neck. Later that night, over dinner, I commented on Oliver’s maladjustments to my father. “There’s nothing wrong with that boy, Brian,” he said to me after I’d finished relaying how the kid had actually shrieked and ran away from a pop-fly. “Do you think everyone was born to be an athlete? I can’t shoot a basketball to save my life. And as I recall,” he said, winking at me while lowering his voice to a conspiratorial tone, as if he didn’t want my mother, who was seated right beside him at the table, to overhear, “you were no Babe Ruth when you first started playing, either.”