A Taste for Red

by Lewis Harris

  I ran across the shadowed yard in a crouch, holding my pack in my arms. I stood with my back pressed against the garage door, as if balancing along a narrow ledge. I stared back through the woods but couldn't make out Foote and Fumio. They'd probably run off—cowards! I didn't need them anyway. But wait, there they were. I saw them now. They were looking down the road, as if distracted.

  I bit back a shriek as the garage door suddenly jerked into life behind me. The paneled door started to rise, squealing and clunking as it cranked up from the concrete drive. I dashed away from the opening door, snatching up my bag, twenty-two sticks of dynamite swinging wildly in my grasp. I saw Fumio and Foote bolt into the woods, scrambling away from the dirt road as a white van barreled into sight, trailing a thick cloud of dust. I plunged into the bushes as the van wheeled around the bend and slowed, then pulled into the darkened garage. Doors opened and closed inside the garage, and then there was nothing. The garage door remained open. I made out the back of the parked van, and beside it, the back of a dark sports car—Larch's car.

  "Psst!" Fumio spit, crawling up behind me. "Let's get out of here!" He tugged at my shoulder.

  I swatted his hand away and told him to be quiet.

  Foote crunched up through the bushes and said enough was enough. "Let's go, guys," he insisted, obviously rattled.

  "That's the white van from yesterday," I said.

  "You don't know that!" Fumio snapped.

  "The other car in the garage is the one Ms. Larch was driving."

  "Fine," Foote said. "You can call the cops when we get home." He had his big head near mine in the bushes. He looked awfully nervous, but at least he didn't seem to be thinking about kissing me today. And nervous was definitely an understatement—he looked scared witless.

  The same as Fumio.

  The same as me, I had no doubt.

  "C'mon, guys, it's gonna be dark soon," Fumio said, his voice cracking.

  He was right, but that just meant we needed to hurry. I hitched my pack onto my shoulders and rushed across the yard toward the house. I heard the sharp intake of breath behind me as I left.

  "Don't!" Fumio groaned after me.

  I raced, bent over, and crouched down next to the tarp-covered car. My heart thudded behind my chest-bone, the wild beat pounding in my neck and ears. I slunk around to the end of the tarp as Foote and Fumio rushed up.

  Foote begged in a whisper, "Please, Svet, let's call this off."

  Fumio lifted up the edge of the tarp and let out a low whistle. "Check it out," he breathed, raising the tarp even higher. It was the front end of a canary-yellow Corvette. The exposed vanity plate read: SCI-GUY. "This is Mr. Boyd's car!"

  The missing science teacher! The one who had "skipped town"! The one Ms. Larch had replaced! But I didn't understand...

  "He must be who's driving the van!" Foote declared, too loudly.

  I frowned, squeezing his arm and shushing him. I leaned forward and spied around the corner to the front of the house. No lights had come on in any of the windows. No sound came from inside. It looked as if the garage door was still open. This close to the house, the smell of rot was stifling. My skin tingled all over; warning bells screamed inside my head like a fire alarm.

  "Hey, guys—" Fumio started.

  "Maybe you're right, Svet," Foote said.

  "Guys—"

  "Maybe Larch is mixed up in something"

  "Guys, look—"

  "Maybe she and Mr. Boyd are up to no good."

  "Guys—I don't think Mr. Boyd's been up to anything lately." Fumio finally got his words out.

  He'd dragged the tarp completely off the hood of the Corvette and was staring through the windshield at a dead guy propped up in the driver's seat.

  It was definitely a dead guy.

  I was looking at a dead guy.

  I really needed to swallow, but my throat had turned to sandpaper, dry as a bone.

  ThunkThunkThunkThunkThunk.

  My heart galloped like a champion racehorse. It beat so hard it hurt.

  The body behind the steering wheel hardly seemed real. It looked like a skeleton—or a mummy—wrinkled like a prune, and leathery. It was just bones and skin, deflated, the life leaked out of it—or sucked out of it.

  "Mr. Boyd..." Foote whispered. He walked up to the car window like a zombie and peered inside. The sunken face had a weird leer frozen on it. Its eyes were invisible behind mirrored sunglasses. The brown mop of hair looked like a wig. "It's him." Foote slowly lifted a finger and tapped the glass.

  Fumio said, "Trust me, he's not gonna hear you."

  A sharp banging sound came from somewhere inside the house, and we ducked back down, huddled like puppies inside a cardboard box, shivering. I peered around the corner, but there was still no movement.

  "I'm out of here," Fumio said.

  "No," I said. "We've got to go inside."

  Foote didn't say anything. He just reached back with his good arm and punched me hard on the shoulder.

  "Jerk!" I said.

  "You're the jerk!"

  Fumio said, "You are a jerk, Svetlana. There's no freaking way we're going in there."

  I threw my thumb at the Corvette. "That proves I'm right."

  "That proves this is a job for the cops," he said.

  "You boneheads don't get it. Larch is a monster!" I nodded at the body behind the wheel. "That guy was bled dry. Vampire food. Larch drained your old science teacher and took his job. She wants to turn Sunny Hill Middle School into a giant kid buffet." I looked from one frightened face to the other. "She can't be arrested—she's not even human."

  "There's nothing we can do about it!" Fumio insisted.

  "We're the only ones that can do anything," I said. "If the cops come swarming up here, she's just going to escape—even if they catch her, she'll get away. She could turn into a bat for all we know. And if she gets away, there'll be no stopping her." I sounded like Lenora Bones now, and I knew everything I said was true. I breathed in deep, the sickening rot spoiling the air. I sucked in the evil—and hated it.

  I grabbed Foote and Fumio by their wrists and squeezed. You've got to help me, I thought, directing the command into their stunted, masculine brains. We must destroy Sylvia Larch. I bored my psychic command into their thick skulls, willing them to obey. "We must destroy the Kensington Vampire."

  "You want us to ... kill our science teacher?"

  "She's already dead—we just need to stop her."

  "But what can we do?"

  I shrugged off my backpack and unzipped it. I pulled out the bundled sackcloth and unrolled it, displaying the pointed stakes and mallet.

  "No way," Foote groaned.

  I opened the bag wider, revealing the dynamite that filled the rest of the pack.

  "You're a psycho," Fumio breathed.

  Foote said, "I don't want you to be my girlfriend anymore."

  Nineteen

  I crawled on my hands and knees along the ground in front of the house. The daylight had turned to dusk. It was still light in the orange-streaked sky, but it was dark in the surrounding woods, and getting darker by the moment. Dad would certainly be angry by now wondering where I was. Mom would be worried. I looked over my shoulder at Foote and Fumio crawling behind me. Fumio carried a stake and mallet. Foote gripped the other stake in his good fist.

  I peeked into the opened garage. The space was dark, crowded with the van and the sports car. It stank of oil and dust and underlying rot. I duck-walked between the vehicles. The door leading into the house was closed. At the rear of the garage, stacked against a freezer, three bikes leaned in the shadows—girls' bikes. I stood quietly and pointed out the bicycles as the two boys tiptoed inside behind me. Their eyes grew wide in the half-light.

  "Holy—" Fumio began and didn't finish.

  Foote said, "The two red ones are Marsha's and Madison's—the same bikes, the same baskets, everything."

  "What if they're like ... Mr. Boyd?" Fumio whispered. He held the mallet raise
d, ready to swing in an instant.

  I couldn't think about the girls being like Mr. Boyd. The Bone Lady had said that a vampire might take weeks to drain a victim. I dropped to my knees and unzipped my backpack. The dynamite smelled like wet cardboard. I reached inside. The sticks were damp, sweating. They were hot from being inside the bag strapped across my back. Ms. Bones had kept the dynamite in the basement of her house inside an ice chest to keep it cool. It was a bad thing when old dynamite began to overheat. It became unstable. It began to sweat nitroglycerin.

  I was sweating, too.

  What if this bag of explosives blew up right in my face? That would be a fine plan. The blast might still destroy Sylvia Larch, but it wouldn't save the girls—if they could be saved—and it certainly wouldn't be pleasant for the boys. Or me.

  "What?" Foote whispered, wondering what I was doing.

  "I'm going to leave this dynamite out here," I said softly, indicating the bag.

  "What if we need it," Fumio asked.

  "Can't use it in the house anyway—not while we're inside. Plus it's unstable."

  "Great, you're a perfect match, then," Fumio said.

  "Put it inside the freezer," Foote suggested.

  I looked at the freezer behind the bikes. That wasn't a bad idea. It was about the size of a refrigerator knocked over on its side. It was old, off-white, with a thick door over it like a giant lid. My grandma had one just like it in her basement in Texas. She kept it filled with hamburger meat and ribs. I reached for the silver handle and hesitated. What was this freezer filled with? I glanced at the bikes leaning against it. They were already gathering dust. What if the girls were...?

  I opened the freezer lid. A burp of foul air wafted out, warm and musty. I wrinkled my nose at the rank smell. The freezer was empty, not even working. It was warmer inside the old box than it was inside the garage. I couldn't leave the dynamite in there.

  "Gross," Fumio said. "Shut that stinking thing."

  I quietly closed the lid. I set the backpack of dynamite on the garage floor and pushed it beneath the van, where it would be hidden and out of the way. Foote had moved over to the closed door leading into the house. He had his ear pressed against it, listening. No light shone from under it. He shook his head to show he didn't hear anything. I made a "gimme" gesture to Fumio and took the stake and mallet from him. He gave them up easily.

  I motioned to Foote, and he turned the doorknob slowly. The door clicked open. As it swung inward, a terrified look fell over his face. I gritted my teeth, imagining the door creaking wildly, screeching open on rusted hinges, but it eased open in a yawning silence. Cold air washed into the garage.

  I stepped through the doorway into a shadow-filled laundry room. A washing machine and dryer were pushed against the wall. Shelves were stacked with bleach bottles and detergent boxes. An open doorway led into the kitchen. Another door was closed. Light came from under it—and so did the sugary scent of bubblegum.

  I pointed. "There."

  Foote pulled the door open. I pushed him and his big head out of the way. A dozen concrete steps led down into a lighted basement. The bubblegum smell was strong: Not as strong as the rotting smell—but definitely there. I eased down the steps. My scalp tingled as I descended. The edge of a table came into sight. Then two shoes, two legs, two hands, and finally the whole of Sandy Cross and her mass of blond hair. Beyond her were two more tables—Madison laid out on one and Marsha on the other. Or maybe it was the other way around. I couldn't tell which was which. They were flat on their backs.

  "Are they...?"

  "No," I said to Foote, who'd crept halfway down the steps after me. I saw that the girls were still breathing, although they made no other movement. Each was laid out on a metal table, looking asleep, although they weren't sleeping—they'd have woken up by now if they were.

  "I can't believe it," Foote said.

  "What?" Fumio's urgent whisper came from the top of the stairs.

  The girls were all slack-faced, their breathing shallow, their eyes closed. They had on the same clothes they'd been wearing when I'd last seen them, Thursday after school. Ladybug earrings dangled from each earlobe.

  "Are they drugged?" Foote wondered.

  "What is it?" Fumio asked from above.

  "Tell him to bring down some bleach," I told Foote. I slid the wooden stake into my belt, setting the mallet aside. I shook Sandy's shoulders, and she grumbled. "Wake up," I said. Her face wrinkled into a frown and then went slack again. "Wake up." I shook harder. She moaned and I patted her on the cheek. "Wake up, loser."

  Just the sight of her put me in a bad mood.

  Each of the girls had a gauze bandage taped inside the crook of her arm—just like a person who had donated blood. Only nobody around here was donating. I slapped Sandy's face harder. "Snap out of it, Sleeping Beauty."

  "Take it easy," Foote said, coming back down the steps with wide-eyed Fumio in tow. Fumio at least had a jug of bleach with him.

  "You take it easy," I said. "We need to get out of here, or we're all going to end up on these tables."

  "Holy smokes," Fumio marveled, staring at the girls. "You were freaking right."

  I grabbed the bleach and tilted a chin toward Marsha and Madison. "Start waking up those two." Sandy's eyelids fluttered as I unscrewed the bleach cap. "C'mon, you," I said. I poured a few drops of bleach into the cap and held it under her nose. She sputtered and turned her head. I followed with the cap, and she coughed and swatted at my hand. Her eyes winced against the light. "Get up, bonehead."

  She gagged, pushing my hand away, then sat up coughing. "Ugh," she moaned. She shook her bob of nightmarish blond hair and balled fists into her eyes, rubbing. "Aaaghth," she slobbered. She wiped drool from the corner of her mouth.

  Nice.

  Fumio and Foote were bringing the other two around. "Give me some of that bleach," Foote said.

  Sandy Cross yawned and then hacked. She looked about the room, her pale face twisted into an ugly mask. Her hair was a blond wreck. She had lumps of dried sleep in the corners of her eyes. She made that awful "aaaghth" sound again. She glared around the room, taking it in, taking us in.

  "This isn't the Food Court," she croaked.

  Twenty

  It was cruel fate having to save these bimbos. What a bunch of complainers! Geez, with the questions—blah, blah, blah! And Fumio couldn't keep that blasted mouth of his shut! Going on about shriveled-up Mr. Boyd outside in his Corvette. Could the load of them possibly make a louder racket? What was this, group amnesia? Did everyone just forget that there was a bloodthirsty vampire in the house?

  "Shut up!" I hissed.

  The girls climbed off their tables, looking as confused and mean as wet cats. And looking at us as if the whole thing was our fault.

  They didn't have a clue.

  "What's going on?" Sandy practically shouted.

  I grabbed her by the shoulders. "Shh!"

  She pushed me away and stumbled backward, glancing at the bandage across her arm. She poked the red-stained gauze with a finger. Her angry expression melted into concern. "Where are we?" she asked, looking up.

  "Oh, man," Fumio said, rolling his eyes. "You don't want to know."

  "I'm starving," Marsha said.

  "Yeah," Madison chimed in.

  This from two girls who could have easily passed for a pair of chopsticks, for two talking soda straws. Of course they were starving! They'd been starving since birth!

  Sandy Cross was taking notice of the metal tables now. "What is this place?"

  "You're in Larch's basement," Foote told her.

  Sandy frowned. "Ms. Larch—our teacher?"

  "We just saw Ms. Larch—" Marsha began.

  "At the mall," Madison finished.

  "Well, you ain't in the mall no more," Fumio said. "Larch put the mojo on you."

  I snapped my fingers and told him to get the girls out of here. "C'mon, let's get moving." Marsha and Madison opened their beaks to squawk, but I froze them
with a stare. "There's no time for catch up now—just get up the stairs."

  "Ketchup?" Madison said.

  Oh, boy.

  I told Fumio to get the girls on their bikes and get them down the road ASAP. "Just get everyone out of here. Call the cops when you reach somebody's house."

  Foote sighed. "Now she wants to call the cops."

  Fumio said, "What are you two going to do?"

  I lifted the mallet from the table. "We're gonna look around."

  Twenty-one

  I pulled aside a heavy curtain in the living room and peeked out the window. Beyond the smudged glass, the girls pushed their bikes away from the house and followed Fumio around the bend in the road. They were each staring back over their shoulders, their pale faces indistinct in the gathering gloom. Then they were gone, swallowed in the trees. It was too dark to see through the woods now, the sun had fled.

  Foote crouched wearily in the center of the room, looking toward the worn steps and banister leading upstairs. The living room was drenched in murky shadow, spotted with the dark shapes of furniture. End tables bracketed a couch. There was a low coffee table. A desk butted up against a wall. A grandfather clock loomed silently, its pendulum hanging dead. Dusty lamps hunched, unlit. Enormous paintings tilted crooked on the walls.

  I surveyed the silence and rot, my eyes finally following the banister up.

  I pointed to the stairs, and Foote frowned, shaking his head.

  I pointed.

  He shook.

  I pointed.

  His face scrunched into a pained expression. "Let's go," he whispered. Meaning leave.

  This was going to be like pulling teeth, but I needed his help. I slid the stake from my belt and tightened my grip on the mallet. The hammer was heavy. The stake was thick, like the fat end of a pool cue. The wood point had been shaven sharp. The weapons felt good in my hands. They filled me with a confidence that I didn't dare let waver. If for a moment I allowed fear to take hold, I would be strangled in its grip.