It never came.
Instead, the darkness intensified until he saw only blackness.
For a moment, he experienced nothing at all. No sound, no light, no sensation of any kind. He had no idea how long this lasted.
Slowly, he began to feel his body, like coming to after a fainting spell.
His eyes adjusted to the darkness.
It seemed he’d been transported to an entirely different place: a vast ocean, endless in every direction.
He was submerged deep in the boundless watery expanse, but felt no impulse to breathe.
Wayne knew, of course, that he hadn’t actually been transported anywhere.
He was dead.
He hadn’t expected it to feel like such a relief.
“You’re not dead, Daddy.”
Wayne’s heart jolted as Ruby appeared next to him, her white dress floating around her. She was as blurry as the rest of his surroundings, radiating a strange light.
“And I’m not either,” she said.
“Ruby,” Wayne said, finding he could somehow speak underwater. “We’re not dead?”
“Nope,” Ruby said. “Want to meet my new friend?”
Before he could respond, another glowing body floated up next to Ruby.
“This is Timothy,” Ruby said.
Timothy, a little boy he guessed to be four or five, came closer. He wore a white polo, khaki shorts, and a blank look that made Wayne’s skin crawl.
“Nice to meet you, Timothy,” Wayne said.
The boy just stared.
“He’s been down here for a while,” Ruby said, as if it was very impressive. “But he’s not dead either.”
“I have a twin brother,” Timothy said. “Eli.”
“Oh,” Wayne said. “Is he…down here too?”
Timothy shook his head. “I miss my family,” he said, his voice devoid of emotion.
“I’m sorry,” Wayne said, suddenly becoming aware of another presence hovering around them. This one wasn’t a body, and it wasn’t glowing. It was more of a…shadow. It was even more unnerving than Timothy, appearing right next to them, then farther away, then somewhere else, impossible to pin down, accompanied by a sort of buzzing scream.
“That’s the Keeper,” Ruby said.
“Oh,” Wayne said.
“He says he’s willing to let me go. And heal me. If you do something for him.”
“What’s that?”
“Bring him seven more.”
Wayne’s insides went cold. “Ruby…”
“But the Keeper only wants young, strong ones.”
Timothy nodded along confidently.
“I don’t understand…” Wayne said.
“The Keeper needs the ones who won’t follow,” Timothy added.
Wayne looked at his daughter as the Keeper pinballed from location to location faster than before.
“Can you do that, Daddy?”
“I…I don’t know…”
“You don’t love me?” Ruby suddenly looked and sounded distressed.
“Of course I do, baby.”
“Then please! Do what the Keeper asks, Daddy!”
“I…”
As he stared at his daughter, everything blurred to black as her words blended with the buzzing scream, getting louder and louder and then abruptly cutting out.
Wayne was back to looking at the dirt wall of the spring, the water mercilessly pressing in on him from all sides. Rather than rudely flinging him away, Wayne felt himself deliberately lifted to the surface and lightly shoved toward the shore.
The retching was just as terrible as it had been the night before, maybe even worse. When it was done, Whitewood lay in the dirt in his blue swim trunks, trying to make sense of what he’d just experienced.
His daughter was gone.
But there was a way to get her back. Fully healed.
He propped himself up on one elbow as he noticed a boarded-up building about a hundred yards away.
* * *
—
THE WHITEWOOD SCHOOL opened in August of 1979, just four months after Wayne Whitewood first visited Bleak Creek.
It filled a need the people of Bleak Creek didn’t even realize they’d had, finally getting the kids in town to fall in line.
It was an immediate success.
* * *
—
“WHERE ARE THE ones who won’t follow, Daddy?” Ruby asked.
“I’m trying, Ruby-girl,” Whitewood said.
It was the fall of 1982, and the new year had just begun at the Whitewood School. While Whitewood felt like he’d aged a decade in just three years, even his hair going prematurely white, Ruby hadn’t changed at all. She was still the sweet seven-year-old she’d been when the Keeper had taken her. He was now seeing her monthly, his body unable to visit more often, as each violent invasion of the spring water took him days to fully recover.
“The Keeper says you’re not trying hard enough.”
“I’ve given him a few kids now, and he spit ’em all out! And they all ended up…well, changed. Like the life had been taken right out of ’em.”
“He says they weren’t strong enough.”
“I don’t know what else to do,” Whitewood said, growing frustrated. “None of those kids would not bow to my authority. I pushed them so hard.”
“Sorry, Daddy, you need to push harder.”
“I just…You gotta tell the Keeper this is gettin’ ridiculous! I just want you back!”
Whitewood heard the familiar buzzing scream, the shadowy form coming close and pulsing near his head.
Suddenly Ruby began to shriek, her face stretching out like taffy, as if it were being yanked. “Daddy! Help me! Daddy!”
“Stop that!” Whitewood yelled. “Right now!”
Ruby’s face returned to normal. “The Keeper says he’s going to hurt me if you don’t bring him one very soon.”
“Okay, baby, okay,” Whitewood said. “I just…I don’t know if I can do this alone.”
“Then get help!” Ruby shrieked. “Do whatever you have to do!”
“Calm down, Ruby!” Whitewood said.
The black shadow presence of the Keeper enveloped Ruby, the dark cloud seeping through her nose and mouth. Her face grew angular, demented.
“The Keeper is growing impatient!” she said, the voice a mix of Ruby and the grating buzz of the Keeper.
Whitewood felt like he was going to freeze.
The freakish version of his daughter shot toward him, her face inches from his, the inky residue of the Keeper leaking from her obsidian eyes.
“He thirsts for those who will not follow!” she/it screamed.
Whitewood cowered. “I need time,” he said sheepishly.
“How much time do you require!” it yelled.
Whitewood hadn’t expected a negotiation.
“I don’t know…” Whitewood said. “I’ll have to come up with a cover story for any child the Keeper accepts. Explain to the town what happened to ’em. I’m no good to you if I’m locked away.”
“How much time!”
“Uh, ten years?” Whitewood said reflexively, guessing his suggestion would be met with more screaming. Or worse.
Suddenly, the black cloud enveloping Ruby receded into the distance, his daughter’s face her own once again.
“The Keeper says you have ten years,” she said.
Whitewood felt sudden relief, but it was quickly followed by a sinking weight of dread, realizing what the coming years would look like.
“Okay, Ruby. I can do that. I will do that. For you.”
“Thank you, Daddy. I love you.”
“I love you, too, baby girl.”
* * *
—
WHIT
EWOOD NERVOUSLY TAPPED his gloved fingers on his desk and looked at the calendar: September 1992.
It had taken him close to a decade to find four acceptable individuals for the Keeper. He’d done unspeakable things—and gotten others to do even worse by convincing them that it was all for the good of Bleak Creek, and the world—just so he could be reunited with his beloved Ruby.
He had just over a week to find three more kids. Even for a man who had successfully made himself the prophet of a bogus cult, that seemed impossible.
But there was hope. Leif Nelson had practically offered himself up on a silver platter earlier tonight. He had a feeling that meant Rex McClendon would soon find his way to the school as well. And he still had people on the lookout for the one who had escaped, not to mention the new crop of students he was just beginning to break.
Three more.
It could happen.
It would have to happen.
After all, he’d come this far.
21
LEIF WAS PRETTY sure the sour-faced lady at the front of the classroom was looking at him. He was also fairly certain she’d gotten some bad information, because she had just called him something that sounded nothing like Leif or Nelson.
“Yes, you, Candidatus,” she said.
“Oh,” Leif said. “That’s, uh, not me.”
The helper smiled, which was actually worse than when she didn’t. “How sad you don’t know your own name.”
The past twelve hours had been—by a long shot—the most difficult of his life.
After confronting some kind of invisible monster in the spring, he’d been chased down by an all-too-visible monster, who’d caught him and then somehow convinced his mother that he needed to be sent here, to this terrible place.
“For your information,” the helper continued, “Candidatus is Latin for ‘candidate.’ Because you, just like each and every student in this room, are a candidate for reform. If you decide to…” She tapped the large sign on the wall that said FOLLOW. “Do you understand, Candidatus?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Leif said.
“Yes, Helper!” she said. “You call me Helper.”
Leif thought, as far as titles of respect went, ma’am carried more dignity than helper, which was a designation he remembered coveting back in kindergarten. But he wasn’t going to say that. “Okay, Helper.”
She narrowed her eyes in disgust. “You’re just like her,” the woman said with a hushed intensity before redirecting her attention to the whole class. “Candidati, you should know that not only was Candidatus caught by Headmaster trespassing on school grounds in the middle of the night, but he also aided and abetted that student—may she rest in peace—who injured Headmaster’s hands.” Everyone quietly freaked out, though it seemed more like a performance than a genuine response. “He is a complete disgrace. Now please open your Whitewood Learning Guides to page four hundred and sixteen.”
In spite of everything Leif knew about the Whitewood School and its headmaster, he couldn’t help but feel ashamed. He was accustomed to being singled out in class, but that was because he usually had the answer the teacher was after. Now, he felt completely in over his head. Rex should be here instead. He’d know what to do. Probably come up with some completely outlandish plan that would somehow totally work out.
But there was an even better question than What would Rex do?
What would Alicia do?
Or, rather: What did Alicia do?
Leif tried to picture her here, her first day. He was sure she’d handled herself like she always did in difficult situations, with that natural poise. She’d probably seemed brave regardless of how she felt. She’d probably even summoned the nerve to talk back to the helper.
And then Whitewood had killed her.
Leif shuddered, for the first time fully acknowledging that truth.
And now the same man was featured in a huge portrait in front of him, as if murdering Leif’s best friend was a virtue to aspire to. Leif felt himself shaking. He assumed it was more of the involuntary sobs that had been erupting from him for hours, but then he realized it was something else.
He was shaking with anger.
Anger that this righteous organ-playing psychopath had taken from Leif one of the people he loved most in this world. Had forced his mother to turn on him. Had even driven a wedge between him and Rex.
It wasn’t okay.
Leif knew in his gut what Alicia would do.
She would run toward her anger, not away from it.
Embracing his rage, he felt it transforming into courage.
He was speaking before he had time to second-guess it.
“Hey, teach,” he said. “I was wondering: Are you part of Whitewood’s cult that sacrifices students or is that, like, a separate department?”
The blood drained from the helper’s face as she stared at Leif in shock.
“You just earned yourself a trip to the Roll,” she said.
The students were shocked again, but this time it seemed genuine.
* * *
—
AS HE LAY on the floor of Thinking Shed Number Two wrapped up in a cheap carpet like an enchilada, Leif considered his options.
Following his rude introduction to the Roll, during which he’d believed that his head might legitimately twist off his body like a mistreated G.I. Joe figure, he questioned if open rebellion was worth it. What exactly did his smart-ass outburst accomplish other than giving him a chance to marinate in his own pee?
Sure, it had felt amazing to go against his passive instincts. It was intoxicating to swim out into the spring when Rex was frozen in fear, and calling out the helper in class was electrifying, like he’d tapped in to some suppressed inner rebel. But where had that gotten him? Right here in this moldy room, struggling to breathe.
Yeah, it was probably best to just hunker down and wait.
Save the boat-rocking for someone else.
* * *
—
LEIF SHUFFLED THROUGH the cafeteria with his tray of mush—which, after going so long without food, actually looked appetizing—and sat down by himself for lunch. The relief he experienced once he was let out of the Roll had confirmed his earlier decision to simply do as he was told. It wouldn’t be hard. There was only one rule around this place: Follow. He was sort of an expert at it.
As he was convincing himself that he legitimately liked the flavor of the lukewarm paste that matched the color of the walls, he was startled by someone knocking into him, dropping her entire bowl of mush into his lap.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” a girl about Leif’s age with dark hair and thick eyebrows said as she bent over to pick up her bowl and tray.
“What’s going on over there?” a young helper with sideburns that reminded Leif of Jason Priestley said as he rushed toward them.
“I tripped,” the girl said. “I’m so sorry, it was an accident. I’ll clean it up.”
“It’s okay,” Leif said, as he wiped the mess off his legs and onto the floor.
“It’s not okay!” the helper said, two more helpers hovering behind him in case backup was needed. “There’s no talking during mealtime!”
The girl began to stand up, but as her face passed by Leif’s ear, she whispered, “Shoe.”
“Come on, let’s go, Candidatus,” the helper said, practically pushing the girl along. “Headmaster doesn’t appreciate clumsiness. Sit by yourself over there. And I hope you aren’t expecting a replacement meal.”
“Of course not, Helper,” the girl said, sitting down all the way across the room.
“Quiet!”
Leif kept his head down as he wiped the remaining glop from his legs, confounded by the entire incident. What had she even tripped on?
As he went to wipe some flecks off his beige Keds, Leif noticed a
small piece of paper sticking out of the left one.
Shoe.
Leif’s heart beat faster as, after a quick glance in both directions to make sure no helpers were nearby, he slid the paper out of his sneaker.
He hid it in his fist and rose to the table before bending back down, pretending to notice one last bit of the girl’s lunch on his jumpsuit.
He unfolded the paper with shaking fingers. It was a note in purple ink on a piece of stationery with a unicorn on the top.
Alicia was my friend, the note said.
So you are too.
Keep fighting.
J
* * *
—
LEIF WAS AMAZED at the power ten words could have.
They proved to him that Alicia had made a mark on this place. In her short time here, she’d inspired J. And who knew who else.
As Leif walked to the Leisure Room that afternoon, he reached into his jumpsuit pocket and rubbed J’s note between his fingers. He was overcome with a deep shame for giving up so easily, for so quickly retreating to his tendency to defer.
Since his arrival, Leif had wanted to believe that Rex was coming up with some kind of plan to save him, to expose the school for what it was. But Leif was the one with the advantage of being on the inside. If he could get through to even just some of his peers, could convince them that they too could choose not to follow, it might have a ripple effect. Maybe they could be the ones to change things around here. Maybe they could take down the whole school.
He found himself thinking that Rex would be proud, but then he realized that’s probably not how leaders thought.
This wasn’t going to be easy.
* * *
—
LEIF TOOK A seat in the corner of the meeting hall and watched his schoolmates quietly file in for Reports. He’d spent most of his day—including a four-hour lecture on the evils of pop culture (the two C’s in C&C Music Factory, they’d been taught, actually stood for crack and cocaine)—resisting the voice in his head telling him that leading a rebellion would be foolish.
The Lost Causes of Bleak Creek Page 23