by Dan Wells
“A death ritual?” asked Mom. Margaret put down the trocar and looked at me; I could feel their eyes boring into me, and I knew I was in trouble. I’d said far too much. “Would you like to explain yourself?” asked Mom.
I needed to play this off somehow, but I was too deep into it. “I was just saying that the killer wasn’t playing with the bodies,” I said. “That’s good, right?”
“You were excited,” Mom accused. “You were tickled pink about this man’s dead body and the way it was torn open.”
“But—”
“I saw joy in your face, John, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before, and it was because of a dead body—a real person, with a real family and a real life, and you can’t get enough of it.”
“No, that’s not—”
“Out,” Mom said, her voice thick with finality.
“What?”
“Out,” she said. “You’re not allowed in here anymore.”
“You can’t do that!” I shouted.
“I’m the owner and your mother,” she said, “and you’re getting far too worked up about this, and I don’t like the way you’re acting or the things you’re talking about.”
“But—”
“I should have done this a long time ago,” she said, putting a hand on her hip. “You’re restricted from the back room—Margaret won’t let you in either, and I’ll let Lauren know, too. It’s time for you to get some normal hobbies and some real friends, and I don’t want to hear any back talk about it.”
“Mom!”
“Not any,” she said. “Go.”
I wanted to hit her. I wanted to hit the walls and the counters and the dead farmer on the table and pick up the trocar and jam it into Mom’s stupid face and suck her brain right out—
No.
Calm down.
I closed my eyes. I was breaking too many rules. I couldn’t think like that; I couldn’t let that rage take over. I kept my eyes closed and slowly peeled off my gloves and mask.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I—” I couldn’t just walk out of here and never come back, I had to fight, and . . .
No. Calm down.
“I’m sorry,” I said again. I took off my apron and walked out the back door. I could deal with this later. Right now my rules were more important.
I had to keep that monster behind its wall.
I hated Halloween. It was all so dumb—no one was really scared, and everyone walked around covered with fake blood or rubber knives or, worst of all, costumes that weren’t even scary. Halloween was supposed to be the night when evil spirits walked the Earth—the night when druids burned children in wicker cages. What did that have to do with dressing up like Spider-Man?
I stopped caring about Halloween when I was eight, about the same time I started learning about serial killers. That doesn’t mean I stopped dressing up, just that I stopped picking my own costumes—each year my mom would choose something, and I’d wear it and ignore it and then forget about it until the next year. Someday I’d have to tell her about Ed Gein, whose mother dressed him as a girl for most of his childhood. He spent most of his adulthood killing women and making clothes out of their skin.
This year, you’d have thought that Halloween would be pretty cool—after all, we had a real demon in town, with fangs and claws and everything. That ought to count for something. But none of us knew about it yet, and it had only killed two people so far, so instead of cowering in our basements praying for salvation, we ended up in the high school gym pretending to enjoy a Halloween dance. I’m actually not sure which is worse.
School dances in junior high had been pretty terrible, and Mom made me go to all of them. Since she had no intention of changing that policy when I got to high school, I hoped that at least the dances would get better. They didn’t. The Halloween dance turned out to be especially stupid—a time for all the awkward, ungainly, half-developed mutants in high school to get together, in costume, and stand by the walls of the gym while colored lights flashed anemically and the vice-principal played year-old songs over the school PA. As part of Mom’s “make some real friends” initiative she was, as always, forcing me to go, though in a gesture of goodwill she allowed me to pick my own costume. Because I knew it would piss her off, I went as a clown.
Max was an army commando of some kind, wearing his dad’s camouflage jacket and some blobby brown makeup on his face. He’d also brought a plastic gun, despite the school’s repeated warning not to bring weapons, so of course the principal had taken it at the door.
“This sucks,” said Max, punching his fist and glaring across the gym at the principal. “I’m going to go steal it back, dog, I really am. You think he’s going to give it back?”
“Did you just call me ‘dog’?” I asked.
“Dude, I swear I’m going to get my gun back, and he won’t even know it. My dad showed me some sweet moves—he’ll never know I was even there.”
“You’re wearing the wrong camouflage,” I said. We were in our regular position, lurking in the corner, and I was watching the flow of people to and from the refreshments and the walls.
“My dad got this jacket in Iraq,” said Max, “it’s as real as it gets.”
“Then it’ll be awesome when Mr. Layton hides your gun in Iraq,” I said, “but we’re at a school dance in midwestern America. If you don’t want him to see you, you need to dress up as a car-crash victim. There’s a lot of those tonight. Or you need a fake bullet hole in your forehead.” Cheap prosthetic gore was the order of the day for at least half of the guys at the dance. You’d think that two gruesome murders in the community would make people a little more sensitive about that, but there you go. At least no one dressed up as an eviscerated auto mechanic.
“That would have been sweet,” said Max, looking at a passing plastic bullet hole. “That’s what I’m going to do tomorrow night for trick-or-treating—it’ll scare the crap out of ‘em.”
“You’re going trick-or-treating?” laughed a voice. It was Rob Anders, walking past with a couple of his friends. They’d all hated me since third grade. “Couple of little babies going trick-or-treating—that’s for kids!” They walked past laughing.
“I’m only going because of my little sister,” Max grumbled, glaring at their backs. “I’m going to get my gun; this costume looks way cooler with a gun.” He stalked off toward the far door, leaving me alone in the dark. I decided to get a drink.
The refreshment table was pretty sparse—a tray of limp vegetables, a couple of half-donuts, and a bowl full of apple juice and Sprite. I poured myself a glass and immediately dropped it when somebody bumped me from behind. The juice fell back into the bowl, along with my cup, splashing up and soaking my wrist and arm. Rob Anders and his buddies snickered as they walked away.
I used to have a list of people I was going to kill one day. It was against my rules now, but sometimes I really missed that list.
“Are you it?” asked a girl’s voice. I turned and saw Brooke Watson, a girl from my street. She was dressed a little like my sister had been the other night, in clothes from the eighties.
“Am I what?” I asked, fishing my cup out of the bowl.
“The clown from It, that Stephen King book,” said Brooke.
“Nope,” I said, wringing out my sleeve into the salvaged cup and sopping it with napkins. “And I think that clown was named Pennywise.”
“I don’t know, I’ve never read it,” she said, looking down. “It’s on my parents’ bookshelf, though, and I’ve seen the cover, so I thought that was maybe what you were dressed up as—I don’t know.”
She was acting funny, like she was . . . I couldn’t tell. I had trained myself to read visual cues from people I knew well, so that I could tell what they were feeling, but someone like Brooke was illegible to me.
I said the only thing I could think of. “You’re a punk?”
“What?”
“What do they call people from the eighties?” I asked.
�
��Oh,” she laughed. It was a beautiful laugh. “I’m my mother, actually—I mean, these are her clothes from high school. I guess I should tell people I’m Cyndi Lauper, though, or something, because dressing up as your mother is pretty lame.”
“I almost dressed up as my mother,” I said, “but I was worried about what my therapist would say.”
She laughed again, and I realized that she thought I was joking. It was probably for the best, since telling her the second half of my Mom costume—a giant fake butcher knife through the head—would probably freak her out. She was really quite pretty—long blond hair, bright eyes, and a wide, dimpled smile. I smiled back.
“Hey Brooke,” said Rob Anders, walking up with a malicious grin. “Why are you talking to that little kid? He still goes trick-or-treating.”
“Really?” asked Brooke, looking at me. “I was gonna go, too, but I wasn’t sure—it still sounds fun, even if we are in high school now.”
I may not understand whatever emotion Brooke was broadcasting, but embarrassment was one I was all too familiar with, and Rob Anders was shedding it now in waves.
“I . . . yeah,” said Rob. “I think it does sound kind of fun. Maybe I’ll see you out there.”
I felt a sudden urge to stab him.
“But what about this clown getup, John?” he said, turning his attention to me. “You gonna juggle for us, or cram a whole bunch of yourself into a car?” He laughed, and glanced behind him to see if his friends were laughing as well, but they’d wandered off to talk to Marci Jensen—she was dressed as a kitty, in a costume that made it very obvious why Max was obsessed with her bra. Rob stared for a moment, then turned back quickly. “So what’s it gonna be, clown? Why ya smiling so big?”
“You’re a great guy, Rob,” I said. He looked at me oddly.
“What?” he asked.
“You’re a great guy,” I said. “That’s a very good costume, and I especially like the bullet hole in the forehead.” I hoped he would leave now. Saying nice things about people I got really mad at was one of my rules, to help keep things from escalating, but I didn’t know how long I could keep it up.
“Are you making fun of me?” he asked, glaring.
I didn’t have a rule for what happened if the person I complimented didn’t leave.
“No,” I said. I tried to improvise, but I was already off balance. I didn’t know what to say.
“I think you’re smiling because you’re such a retard,” he said, stepping closer. “ ‘Derr, I’m a happy clown.’ ”
He was really making me mad. “You’re . . .” I needed a compliment. “I heard you did well on that math test yesterday. Good job.” It was all I could think of. I should have walked away, but . . . I wanted to talk to Brooke.
“Listen, you weirdo,” said Rob, “this is the party for normal people. The freak party is down the hall, in the restroom with the goths. Why don’t you get out of here?”
He was acting tough, but it was still just acting—typical fifteen-year-old macho posturing. I was so mad I could have killed him, right there, but I forced myself to calm down. I was better than this—and I was better than him. He wanted to act scary? I’d give him scary.
“I’m smiling because I’m thinking about what your insides look like.”
“What?” asked Rob, and then he laughed. “Oh, big man, trying to threaten me. You think you scare me, you little baby?”
“I’ve been clinically diagnosed with sociopathy,” I said. “Do you know what that means?”
“It means you’re a freak,” he said.
“It means that you’re about as important to me as a cardboard box,” I said. “You’re just a thing—a piece of garbage that no one’s thrown away yet. Is that what you want me to say?”
“Shut up,” said Rob. He was still acting tough, but I could see his bluster was starting to fail—he didn’t know what to say.
“The thing about boxes,” I said, “is that you can open them up. Even though they’re completely boring on the outside, there might be something interesting inside. So while you’re saying all of these stupid, boring things, I’m imagining what it would be like to cut you open and see what you’ve got in there.”
I paused, staring at him, and he stared back. He was scared. I let him hang on that fear for a moment longer, then spoke again.
“The thing is, Rob, I don’t want to cut you open. That’s not who I want to be. So I made a rule for myself: anytime I want to cut someone open, I say something nice to them instead. That is why I say, Rob Anders of 232 Carnation Street, that you are a great guy.”
Rob’s mouth hung open like he was about to talk, then he closed it and backed away. He sat down on a chair, still looking at me, then got up again and left the room. I watched him all the way out.
“I . . .” said Brooke. I’d forgotten she was there. “That was an interesting way to get him off your back.”
I didn’t know what to say—she shouldn’t have heard that. Why was I such an idiot?
“Just stuff,” I said quickly, “I . . . heard that in a movie, I think. Who’d have thought it would scare him so much?”
“Yeah,” said Brooke. “I have to . . . it was nice talking to you, John.” She smiled uncertainly, and walked away.
“Dude, that was awesome,” said Max.
I turned around in surprise. “When did you get here?”
“I was here for most of it,” he said, coming around the side of the refreshment table, “and it was awesome. Anders practically crapped his pants.”
“So did Brooke,” I said, looking in the direction she had gone. All I saw was a mass of people in the darkness.
“That was hilarious!” said Max, scooping up some punch. “And after she was so into you, too.”
“Into me?”
“You—you missed that? You’re blind, man. She was so going to ask you to dance.”
“Why would she ask me to dance?”
“Because we’re at a dance,” said Max, “and because you’re a raging furnace of hot clown lovin’. I’d be surprised if she ever talks to you again, though; that was awesome.”
The next night Max and I went trick-or-treating with his little sister Audrey. We did his neighborhood first, his mom following us nervously with a flashlight and a thing of pepper spray. When we finished there, she drove us to my neighborhood, and Mr. Crowley shook his head when we visited their house.
“You shouldn’t be out this late,” he said, frowning. “It’s not safe with that killer out there.”
“All the street lights are on,” I said, “and the porch lights, and we’ve got an adult with us. They even said on the news that they put out some extra police. We’re probably safer tonight than most others.”
Mr. Crowley ducked behind his door to cough loudly, then turned back to us. “Don’t be out too long, you hear me?”
“We’ll be careful,” I said, and Mr. Crowley handed out the candy.
“I don’t want this town to live in fear,” he said sadly, “it used to be so happy here.” He coughed again and closed the door.
Things that had seemed silly in the light of day—fake blood and prosthetic limbs—seemed more ominous now in the darkness of night. More terrifying. The killer was back on everyone’s mind, and they were nervous—all the store-bought, goofy Halloween scares were replaced with true, life-and-death terror. It was the best Halloween ever.
6
“This is Ted Rask with a Five Live News exclusive report from Clayton, a peaceful town in the grip of an escalating crisis some call the Clayton Killer. Many people here are afraid to leave their homes at night, and some are even afraid during the light of day. In spite of this pervading sense of fear, however, there is hope. The police and FBI have made an astonishing breakthrough in their investigation.”
It was six o’clock at night, and I was watching the news. Mom said it was weird for a fifteen-year-old to be so interested in the news, but since we didn’t get Court TV, the local news was usually the only th
ing that interested me. Besides, the serial killer was still a hot topic, and Ted Rask’s ongoing coverage had become the most popular show in town—despite, or perhaps because of, its breathless sense of melodrama. Outside, a November snowstorm raged, but inside we warmed ourselves by the fire of a media frenzy.
“As you remember from my first report on the death of local farmer David Bird,” said Rask, “there was an oily substance found near the site; we initially suspected it was left by some kind of getaway vehicle, but forensic tests have now shown it to be biological in nature. According to an unnamed source inside the investigation, the FBI was able to find in that substance a very small sample of DNA in an advanced state of degeneration. Early this morning, they identified that DNA as being human in origin, but that, unfortunately, is where the trail ends. The DNA does not match either of the victims, nor does it match any of the current suspects, local missing-persons cases, or anyone in the state DNA records. I should stress here that the DNA database we’re dealing with is very limited—the technology is new, and there are very few records in any city that date back more than five years. Without widespread DNA testing comparable to the national fingerprint database, this DNA signature may never be identified.”
He was so steely and serious, as if he could win a journalism award through sheer charisma. Mom still hated him, and refused to watch—it’s only a matter of time, she said, before he starts pointing fingers and somebody gets lynched. Tensions were high in town, and the prospect of a third killing hung over us all like a cloud.
“While police have been testing the crime-scene evidence,” said Rask, “the Five Live News team has been doing an investigation of our own, and we’ve turned up something very interesting: an unsolved case more than forty years old involving a black substance very similar to that found in this case. Could it help catch the killer? We’ll have more on that story tonight at ten. This is Ted Rask, Five Live News. Back to you, Sarah.”
But Ted Rask did not come back at ten. The Clayton Killer got him. His cameraman found him just after eight-thirty in the alley behind their motel, gutted and missing a leg. Smeared on his face and head was a huge blob of acrid black sludge. It must have been hot, because it blistered him red as a lobster.