by Robert Gray
And speaking of barbarians, I found Steve with his feet kicked up on a chair, eating pizza at a table of friends. When he saw Carly Beth and me, he waved us over.
“I was just telling Trent here how your mom packs you candy for lunch. He thinks I’m lying.”
Carly Beth rolled her eyes. “Shouldn’t you be working?”
His mouth swung open as if he’d just been punched in the stomach. “You’re as bad as The Lu-tenant. I am working. I’m entertaining our customers.”
Just then, Lucy rushed by with a steaming tray of food, her molten stare trained on Steve as she handed out the food to the table next to us.
“You see what I have to deal with?” He waved his half-eaten slice of pizza at Lucy. “That girl’s gotta relax with the death stare.”
Carly Beth and I avoided any further comments from Steve by escaping to the soda machine. As we filled up cups with ice, Lucy stormed over.
“He’s useless,” she said, slamming down a rag on the countertop. “He even had the nerve to ask me to get him a slice of pizza. Can you believe that?”
Carly Beth stifled a laugh. “It doesn’t surprise me.”
“We’re here now,” I offered. “You can leave if you want.”
“No—” Lucy huffed. “At least when I’m doing all the work, I’m getting all the tips. I’m fine … just needed to vent.”
“Everything okay?” Mrs. Reynolds asked, walking up behind Lucy.
“Yeah,” Carly Beth, Lucy, and I said at the same time, and in the same tone.
“That’s good. Can you watch over the place for an hour or so, Eve? I need to run to the store. We ran out of fresh basil and olive oil.”
“Yeah, sure, Mrs. Reynolds. No problem.”
“Oh, and I found this in the office. It has your name on it.” She handed me a white letter-sized envelope. “Not sure how it got here. There’s no postage or return address.”
After the restaurant closed and Lucy and Steve left, I pulled the envelope from my back pocket and sat at a table with Griff and Carly Beth. I stared at my typed name on the front for a long while, because I knew nothing good could come from opening it.
“Do you want me to do it?” Griff asked.
I shook my head and peeled back the top flap.
“Maybe it’s from the school,” Carly Beth offered.
It wasn’t. The letter was from The Source.
dEAR EVE,
OUR DEManD IS SIMPLE: IF YOU DO NOT GIVE Us THE BOOK OF SHRIEKS, WE WILL Be FORCED TO KILL AGAIN. WE HAVE OUR NEXT VICTIm, THE acTING PRINCIPAL OF OaK HILL HIGH SCHOOL—DON’T THINK WE ARE SO brAINLESS NOT TO KNOW WHO He REALLY IS.
-THE SOURCE
“But there is some good news,” Griff said after he read the note. “At least we know The Source hasn’t found The Book of Shrieks.”
I snapped my eyes in the direction of Griff’s voice at the mention of the book. It still seemed weird hearing him say the name aloud—and so casually. Up until yesterday, I’d never even considered that a series of books could create life, or that it was anything but pure entertainment. If the books were real, though … what did it mean for the monster race? For my family? And what did this have to do with me?
“Then the book does exist?” Carly Beth asked. She must’ve sensed this burning question in my mind and took it upon herself to ask.
“Hard to say,” Griff said. “But it seems a lot of creatures are trying to find this book, so I have to believe it does.”
Griff handed me the note, and I pressed it flat on the table so everyone could see. “Why would they think I have the book?”
“And what about these stupid capitalization errors,” Carly Beth added. “I mean isn’t that why they invented Caps Lock?”
“Wait a sec.” I hadn’t noticed before. I’d been way too distracted for that. “Look here.” I pointed to the first word incorrectly capitalized: dEAR. Then there’s the an from DEManD.” I pulled out my order pad from my apron and started writing down the lowercase letters.
“The s in Us … and the e in Be,” Carly Beth said.
“Griff added, “The m in VICTIm … And the ac in acTING.”
“The br in brAINLESS and … the e in He,” Carly Beth finished.
I placed the pad on the table, and we all hovered over the words, speechless.
DANSE MACABRE
During the ride home, I thought about whether or not I should tell Mom that Dad had been kidnapped. Carly Beth said I most definitely should, but I reminded Carly Beth that my mom wasn’t human and might take her vengeance out on the entire human race. I think I said, Take it old school like ancient Greece, to be exact.
She needs to know, Carly Beth argued. Maybe she talked to your father … maybe she knows more than you think she does.
Carly Beth was right, of course. I had to tell my mother … but I didn’t want to be the one to do it and see that adorable expression on her face. I couldn’t.
But I did.
“Mom?” I said, peeking into the living room. She was busy decorating for Halloween, putting the final touches on the horrible dead tree, twisted and black, that took up an entire corner of the room.
It made me kind of sad, seeing the Halloween Tree finished. I missed out on decorating it, a Hallows tradition. It reminded me I was growing up, something I couldn’t wait to do not too long ago. But now … now I wanted to stay young forever. I wanted to enjoy Halloween like I had when I was Sam’s age, when I didn’t have to worry about anything except what presents I might be getting, and it seemed that girl was long gone, almost another creature entirely.
Mom stuffed some broken ornaments—a handful of finger bones, a box of squished eyeballs, a few severed bat wings—back into a cardboard box.
“Just finishing up,” she said absently.
“Looking good, Mom. Almost feels like we’re h-home for the h-holidays … Dad’s in trouble; I think The Source has him.” I blurted this last part out in sobs.
Mom sat me down and I told her about the note.
When I finished, my neck felt about as sturdy as a puddle of warm water, and my head sank to my hands. “I don’t know what to do.”
I could hear Mom’s snakes slithering and snapping, their intensity increasing with each passing moment. I had no idea what was going through her head, but I knew it couldn’t be good. “You okay?”
“I think I’ll be attending this dance of yours,” Mom said calmly.
My head sprung up. “Are you sure you want to do that?”
Mom didn’t answer. She didn’t have to. Her eyes, ablaze with golden fire, gave me part of the answer. Her snakes, which hissed murderously, told me the rest.
TWENTY-SEVEN
OLD SCHOOL NEW STUDENT
The next few days passed without incident, though I could sense trouble building around me like an ominous growl before an adorable scream.
When the day of the Dance Macabre finally arrived, I shuffled downstairs—rubbing sleep crumbs from my eyes—and found Mom in the kitchen pulverizing chocolate cake mix in a glass bowl. She looked like she hadn’t slept at all last night.
I thought about trying to calm her down … maybe I could tell her everything would be okay, but I knew better. Besides, I wanted her to have a lot of fight in her, because tonight we were going to need every bit of gorgon.
I had given Sam the task of gathering news from the graveyard under the condition he got up early every morning to let me know what happened. He, of course, accepted and treated the mission like some sacred quest. Every night this past week, I had a taxicab take him to and from the graveyard. Sam patrolled the graveyard with Three Petes, though so far the only reports he had were on how Three Petes liked to cheat while playing graveyard games, especially Bury the Dead.
The doorbell rang.
“Trick or Treat. Mmmm, smells delicious in here,” Carly Beth said as she entered the house. She’d become much more comfortable coming over since her first visit.
“Hungry? I have plenty,” Mom sai
d.
This morning, Mom didn’t try to force human food on me. Instead, she loaded Carly Beth and me up with chocolate in all of its horrible forms: cakes, doughnuts, muffins, cookies, and bars.
“This is the best breakfast ever, Mrs. Hallows,” Carly Beth said between a bite of a double-chocolate chip muffin and a sip of hot pumpkin.
“Eat up,” Mom said. “We got a busy day.”
I drizzled hot chocolate syrup onto my doughnut and shoved huge chunks into my mouth like I was Cousin Flabert, who had three stomachs.
Carly Beth gaped at me as she held a piece of muffin inches from her mouth. “You’re like a human vacuum.”
“I eat a lot when I’m nervous.” I washed the doughnut down with a few gulps of my hot pumpkin and wiped the dribble from my chin.
As we ate, Sam shuffled in, stretching and scratching his belly. He plopped into a chair and started munching on a chocolate bar.
“Sooo?” I asked. “Any news?”
All the sleep in Sam’s face blew away as if I’d just turned on a fan.
“You wouldn’t believe what happened last night.”
I jumped out of my seat. “What! Did you see someone from The Source?”
Sam laced his fingers behind his head and leaned back in his chair. “I beat Three Petes in Corpse Diving last night, eight to five.” He was clearly impressed with himself.
“What about The Source?” I asked.
Sam broke off another piece of chocolate bar and shoved it into his mouth. “Oh, right, that. Haven’t seen a thing.”
At least I still had my backup plan, and I glanced at Carly Beth, who must’ve been thinking the same thing, because she said, “I guess it’s time for some Arts and Crafts.”
As we rushed out my house, we heard the screeching of tires and the fading screams of trapped children. We had missed the bus, which meant Carly Beth had to call her mom to give us a ride.
We got into homeroom just as the morning announcement began. They were once again given by Vice Principal Stringer, since—er—Principal McDougal had taken a short leave of absence.
Carly Beth unzipped her backpack, pulled out a plastic bag and handed it off to me. I peeked into the bag, making sure it still looked okay. Yup, and I handed the bag back.
“Do you think it’ll work?” Carly Beth asked.
“I don’t know. But we don’t have time to try anything else.”
Carly Beth had made a replica of The Book of Shrieks by altering the cover of my spell book. I hated sacrificing my favorite book, but we didn’t have time to find anything better. Besides, I recalled that my spell book looked similar to the Nightmare Books sold at Books & Brimstone back in Gravesville. Hopefully, The Source would think the same thing.
“Still needs some more work,” Carly Beth said. “The glue isn’t holding well, and the letters don’t look old enough. I’ll touch it up after school. With any luck, they won’t open it and see a bunch of spells.”
I reminded her that The Source would probably be too busy running out of the dance to pay attention to the book.
“It’s gonna work,” I added.
It had to work.
The day limped along painfully. Even history class, which mostly consisted of me staring at Warren, moved by at the rate of decay.
Thankfully, all us volunteers would be excused from class after fifth period so we could make the final preparations for the dance, a nice bonus we discovered during the morning announcements.
But by lunchtime, the day felt like three days had already passed, and to make matters worse, Stacey Maxwell and her minions couldn’t keep their nasty glares off me.
Lucy carried her lunch tray over to our table and sat down. “She’s looking at you like you stole her boyfriend. Oh, wait, YOU DID!” Lucy and Steve pounded fists and exploded them.
I smiled, because I felt like I did win one for our team, but when I peeked over at Stacey, at her toxic stare, I didn’t feel all that great.
“Ooh, the Big S looks venom-ish,” Steve said. “I think you made a friend, Eve.”
“Yeah, I’m not afraid of her,” I muttered.
So not true. I was terrified of her.
After lunch, I busied myself with setting up the rented fog machines around our fake graveyard, while Carly Beth put the last touches on the spell book. As hard as I tried to lose myself in my work, I couldn’t get my mind off Dad’s strange disappearance, The Book of Shrieks, and The Source. I was close to connecting everything. I just needed more time. But with my dad missing and possibly in grave danger, every moment was crucial.
Suddenly, I heard a gunshot, and my heart went nuclear. I flipped around to see what had happened and saw that one of the volunteers—Doug, I think his name was—had dropped a whole tray of skull-shaped mugs. Whew! False alarm. But it did snap me back to reality. I noticed my fog machines weren’t pointed at the graveyard at all, and when I glanced over at Carly Beth, I saw she’d painted the floor instead of the book cover.
We realized our mistakes at the same time and laughed nervously. Neither one of us had been able to concentrate, which for some reason made us laugh even harder. When we finished wiping the tears from our eyes, we fixed our projects and began working on the more important task of hiding the book in the graveyard.
I’d just tucked the book beneath a patch of plastic grass when Carly Beth said, “Hey, Warren. What are you doing here?”
Warren gazed around and whistled. “Wow! Place looks amazing.” He took a few bites from a powdered doughnut, then ran his tongue along his lips to clean the sugary excess. “You girls outdid yourselves. This is going to be the best Halloween Bash ever.”
Carly Beth jammed a thumb into my rib. “Ask him?” she whispered.
“Ouch!” I said and flicked my eyes at Carly Beth. She ignored me and nudged her chin at Warren.
“What gives?” Warren asked.
I didn’t want to question Warren about my dad’s disappearance. If it turned out he knew something, I’d have to assume he also worked for The Source, and I didn’t think my heart could handle that.
Carly Beth, however, didn’t share my concern. “So, where’s your dad? We thought he’d show up to make sure everything met his standards.”
“Some business trip. A principal convention in Florida, I think.”
Carly Beth shoved me forward, her eyes telling me to continue the conversation.
“Conference? Really? Has he ever gone to this conference before?”
Warren took another bite of his doughnut and licked his lips. “You want to know something? My dad’s been acting weird. It’s like … I don’t know, like he’s somebody else.”
“Somebody else? What do you mean?” I asked, hoping he didn’t hear the nervousness in my voice.
“For starters, the other day he says goodnight to me, and then he walks into the closet. I mean, how do you forget where your bed is, you know? Then, all of a sudden he’s gone, and there’s this note on the table that says he went to some conference.”
“That is strange. Did he say when he’ll be back?”
“Who cares?”
“Right, who cares,” I said and forced out a giggle.
“So anyway, the reason I came over,” Warren began, scratching the back of his head, “was because I wanted to know where to pick you up tonight. I figured I could meet you at your house, but I don’t know where you live.”
“I—um—” He couldn’t come to my house, not with my mother and brother there, I thought.
Thankfully, Carly Beth saved me. “Ghoulicious Pizza. At the corner of Mills and Broad. Say sevenish.”
“She like your personal assistant or something?” Warren asked, thumbing at Carly Beth.
“Or something,” Carly Beth said, “And don’t forget the corsage.”
“Anything else I should remember?” he said, finishing off his doughnut and meticulously cleaning the sugar off his fingers with his mouth.
“Don’t do that whole fashionably-late thing, either.
Guys think it’s cool, but it’s not,” Carly Beth said.
All sorts of monsters filled the pizza place. Well, pretend ones anyway. The horror theme at Ghoulicious Pizza had made it a hot spot for Halloween Bash goers. And with Mrs. Reynolds’s idea of giving out free candy, we also got hit with an early holiday rush. The big sell, though, was Griff, thanks to Steve.
Carly Beth, Griff, and I had agreed it would be best for him to stay back and keep an eye on the pizza place, just in case Nancy Burnblum or anyone else from The Source decided to show up. To Steve, it seemed a complete waste of resources not to have Griff perform for the crowd. “We could charge like ten bucks a head!” he had argued.
Since the strange and unusual could pass for normal on Halloween, I figured it would be okay, though Mrs. Reynolds refused to charge admission. That didn’t make Steve happy, at all. Every time another customer walked in, Steve muttered, “There goes another ten bucks.”
Griff’s performance consisted of him making pizza for everyone to see. The whole place gathered around the counter to watch a phantom spoon swirl sauce around the pizza dough or watch the mozzarella cheese fall like snow. But when the dough lifted off the countertop and spun in midair, the crowd became captivated and started oohing and ahhing.
Some of the boys were certain they saw strings. “It’s fake. Look, you can see the guy behind the curtain.” Another boy yelled, “I saw this one at Wild Coaster! It’s all done with mirrors and projectors!” But that didn’t stop the nonbelievers from staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed every time the dough started to spin and shape itself into a pizza pie.
Steve sighed loud enough for Carly Beth, Lucy, and me to hear.
“Could’ve charged twenty.”
As for our costumes, Carly Beth decided to go as Alice from Alice in Wonderland. Lucy dressed as the Cheshire Cat and Steve as the Mad Hatter.
I took a much different approach and dressed in one of my “school uniforms.” I had on a long, flowing red skirt with frayed black strips of cloth hanging from it; a red-and-black checkered top; and knee-high black boots. Mom had styled my hair again—more elaborate than before. I decided to keep my hair down and brown this time, but she added deep crimson streaks, spider-braided my bangs, and attached at least a dozen tiny crystal beetles that sparkled purple and blue. She did my makeup, too—Tomb Gray eyeshadow with Carrion Black mascara, and for the lips, Grandma’s favorite … Vampire Bite red. I’d probably get laughed at by the entire school, just like I had on the first day, but I didn’t care. The costume wasn’t about me. It was for my dad and for monsters, in general. So the hecklers at school could laugh till they choked. I had more important things to worry about tonight.