by Derek Milman
The spiders will always hatch out of the flowers. But now I like to think about the moments before, when they’re just flowers, blooming, and they can be pinched closed, so all that prettiness lasts a little longer before the inevitable horror comes.
That’s how I’ll always think about this place now.
The next day, before dawn, I go to Hayley’s room. I lay my palm flat on her door. It’s silent inside, but I get the feeling that Hayley is doing the exact same thing on the other side. Or maybe I’m just imagining that, I don’t know. I kiss her door.
I strap the steamer to the luggage rack on top of the car. I get behind the wheel and roll down the driveway. The gates open, and I’m out. Just like that.
I get on the highway.
I see that green sign on the opposite side now: Moldavia Studios, 14 miles.
As I drive, scenery goes flying past that doesn’t look totally real. It looks like the stuff you decorate a train set with, all the little trees and houses, hobby store crap, rainy Saturday afternoons with dads wearing stained sweatshirts.
I had a train set once. I loved it while I was able to play with it for those few weeks. I was so happy my dad gave me that, that he gave me something. But the sad truth is, a lot more people enjoyed watching it burn—it made for a very cinematic moment in an otherwise forgettable movie.
It’s early morning and there aren’t many cars on the roads, and those that are seem curious to me. I wonder who’s in them, where they’re going, and what they’re escaping from. Because, I think, we’re all escaping from something.
I’ll call Harvard and see if they’ll let me sleep in an empty dorm. If not, I’ll find a motel to crash somewhere in Cambridge. School starts fairly soon anyway.
I drive for a long time, going eighty, into the brightening sky. And then the weirdest thing happens: I get second thoughts. I’m not sure this is the right decision at all, ghosting it like this. Maybe I should have stayed. Maybe this is madness. . . .
All I want to do is talk to Hayley.
And then I remember something.
I pull over into the emergency lane. I get out, take the steamer trunk down, and open it. I pull out everything in a frenzy: books and clothes and papers, all of it scattered on the side of the highway now, some of it blowing away.
I find my journal and snatch it, holding it to my chest with both hands like it might blow away too. I walk away from the car and sit in a clump of weeds on the edge of the highway. I page through the journal until I find what Hayley wrote, near the end of the journal. I remember us sitting in that closet, all those years ago, when she wrote it.
I remember it like it was yesterday.
I want to tell you to do something.
So tell me.
But I don’t really want you to do it. It would hurt.
Then I wouldn’t do it!
I mean, hurt me. . . .
I handed her the journal and the pen. Sometimes writing stuff down is easier. Tell me only the last word. And write the rest . . .
Away, she whispered to me.
I still remember how her lips felt, brushing against my ear.
And she wrote the rest down.
I didn’t write it on the very last page. It’s toward the back. So you’ll have to search to find it.
So it’ll always be there if I need it. . . .
I laugh a little through my tears. And after all these years, I finally look.
Hayley only wrote me one goddamn word.
Run.
Acknowledgments
I’D BE WANDERING ALONE IN A DARK MEADOW WITHOUT THE SHINING light of my agent, Victoria Marini, who never lets a neurotic text go unanswered, never lets me pay for a drink, and shepherded me through the turmoil and ecstasy of writing and publishing my first novel. She is a great protector, an intrepid agent, a smart, sharp editor, and a fantastic friend, who can always make me laugh out loud. Thank you for believing in my writing, my characters, and the dark screwball world of Moldavia, and everything it could be.
And thank you: Penelope Burns, Lia Chan, and everyone at ICM and the Irene Goodman Agency.
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to Donna Bray and the team at B+B and Harper, particularly my visionary editors, Viana Siniscalchi and Kelsey Murphy. I was constantly amazed by your ceaseless passion and your uncanny insights. You worked so hard, nurturing my vision with such wisdom and sensitivity.
Many thanks, also, to Alessandra Balzer, Kristin Daly Rens, Jordan Brown, Claire Caterer, Renée Cafiero, Gina Rizzo, Bess Braswell, Michael D’Angelo, Mark Rifkin, Josh Weiss, Kim Stella, Vanessa Nuttry, and Tiara Kittell.
Thank you, Tom Whalen, Jessie Gang, and Alison Donalty for that stunning, knee-quaking cover.
I am so lucky to have a certifiable force field of brilliant, generous friends and relatives in my collective orbit. People who read draft after draft of my early manuscripts, including various iterations of Scream, offering incisive, supportive criticism at every stage:
• Brian Murray Williams, who carries a torch all his own, and is always always there for me.
• My brother, Jordan Milman, for his undying support, for which I’m forever grateful.
• My sister-in-law, Lorin Milman, who is my most passionate fan and most important beta reader.
• My wonderful parents, Evelyn and Harvey, for all their years of love, support, and encouragement—and for inspiring me to write.
Also: Max Van Bel, Simon Pearl, Devin Vermeulen, Ben Rosenbaum, Alexis Percival, Josh Taylor, Howard Abrams, Michele Jaslow, Beth Kingry Northington, Soman Chainani, Michael Barakiva, Ben Haber, Patrick Carman, Jeff Garvin, and Goldy Moldavsky.
A heartfelt thanks to my fellow Electric Eighteens, for your guidance during the editing process, especially my dear friend Lindsay Champion, and to Pete Knapp and Jocelyn Davies for your early support.
I am forever grateful to Marisa Yeres Gill, who unblinkingly delivered an early manuscript of mine right to publishers, starting me down this mad roller coaster ride.
A shout-out to some teachers of mine, from grade school to college, who encouraged and fostered my nascent creative impulses: Alice Yugovich, Kathy Connon, Jeanne Cooper, Paul Sheehey, Sharon Achinstein, and Albert Cirillo.
I am beholden to my dear friend, clinical psychologist and professor Lauren Weinstock, PhD, for giving me a deeper understanding of mental illness and helping me depict Isabella Moldavia’s schizophrenia with as much sensitivity and accuracy as humanly possible. Any failure to do so is strictly my own.
On this front, I must also extend my deepest gratitude to Andrea, as well as to Elizabeth Roderick, for their crucial feedback.
Thank you to Marlyn E. McGrath and William R. Fitzsimmons at Harvard Admissions, for answering my questions about the current application process.
In my research into mental illness, moviemaking, horror films, and creaky old movie studios, I found these various sources, films, and works of literature particularly insightful: the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5); I Never Promised You a Rose Garden by Hannah Green; The Quiet Room by Lori Schiller & Amanda Bennett; No One Cares about Crazy People by Ron Powers; Lowboy by John Wray; Tarnation (documentary, written and directed by Jonathan Caouette); The Filmmaker’s Book of the Dead by Danny Draven; The Slasher Movie Book by J. A. Kerswell; Horror! 333 Films to Scare You to Death by James Marriott & Kim Newman; All I Need to Know about FILMMAKING I Learned from THE TOXIC AVENGER by Lloyd Kaufman & James Gunn; The Hammer Story by Marcus Hearn & Alan Barnes; The Art of Hammer by Marcus Hearn; Making Movies by Sidney Lumet; Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films (documentary written and directed by Mark Hartley).
About the Author
Photo by Jordan Matter
DEREK MILMAN has worked as a playwright, screenwriter, film school teacher, DJ, and underground humor magazine publisher. A classically trained actor, he has performed on stages across the country and appeared in numerous
TV shows, commercials, and films. Derek currently resides in Brooklyn, New York, where he writes fiction full-time, plays video games really badly, and buys lime-green hoodies made of locally sourced hemp. Scream All Night is his first novel. You can find Derek online at www.derekmilman.com.
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Copyright
Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
SCREAM ALL NIGHT. Copyright © 2018 by Derek Milman. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Cover art by Tom Whalen
Cover design by Jessie Gang
* * *
Digital Edition JULY 2018 ISBN: 978-0-06-266567-6
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-266565-2
* * *
1819202122PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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