Lots of teeth.
Branches slap the windshield, the roof, the windows, as the truck flies over roots and rocks. I hang on to the strap by the door, but all that accomplishes is pulling a muscle in my shoulder. We’re rocking back and forth, and my stomach is somewhere in my mouth, so even though my brain screams, Stop stop STOP, no words come out. There’s a high-pitched whimpering coming from somewhere, and I suddenly realize it’s me.
Beside me, Kelley grips the wheel, his jaw set, his eyes focused right between the headlights. The thing’s powerful hind legs flex as it bounds in front of us, moving in and out of the lights.
“Come on, come on, come on,” Kelley mutters under his breath, and I wonder if he’s talking to the truck or to the thing.
The tree is there so suddenly that I don’t have time to scream. I barely get out a gasp, and then we’re slamming against the trunk of a towering oak. There’s a crunch of metal, and the surprisingly loud pop of the airbags, but even over that, I hear that shriek/howl again. It’s louder this time, and it rises in a cry of pain before trailing off. And then everything is quiet except for the tick of the engine, the creaking of the tree, and my own chattering teeth.
Kelley flings open the door and leaps out while I sit, shaking and staring at the thing pinned between the tree and the truck. Lying against the hood, mouth open, its long tongue is very pink against the dull silver paint. Its eyes are still open, and, the red slowly fades into nothingness.
Kelley leans over it, shaking his head as if he can’t believe it. He meets my eyes through the windshield. “Holy crap, right?”
My legs are shaking. Getting out of the truck is hard for me, but I manage it. I walk across the back of the truck and come around to stand next to Kelley. He’s still smiling when I reach out and punch him as hard as I can.
As his breath whooshes out and he doubles over, I stare at the ruined truck. There’s no doubt that it’s totaled, that it’ll never get us out of here. And I focus on that, because it’s a lot easier than wrapping my brain around the fact that monsters are real, and that Kelley has just killed one.
“Sam,” Kelley wheezes, “I’m sorry about this—”
“About what exactly? The leaving me alone part? Or ignoring when I said I wanted to leave? About ramming your truck into a tree like a lunatic?”
“All of it,” he replies, and he does look sorry. Then that grin again. “But come on. You have to admit this is pretty badass.”
“I want to go home,” I say for what feels like the thousandth time. I think about my phone, probably dead by now, somewhere in the truck. I wonder what time it is. I wonder if it’s past 11:30, and if Linds is worried about me.
Kelley heaves a sigh. “We will. Let me just call . . . I don’t know, my dad, I guess.”
While Kelley reaches into his pocket for his phone, I slump to the ground, leaning against one of the tires. It’s hot against my back. Kelley is lit up in the glow of his phone as he turns it on, so I can see the panic that darts across his face. “Shit.”
“What?”
“I don’t have a signal.”
I laugh. The noise startles Kelley and he glares as giggles pour out of me. “Of course,” I gasp. “Of course you don’t have a signal! And mine is dead! Of course that happens when we’re trapped in a monster-filled forest!”
“Jesus, Sam, calm down. You sound crazy.”
That just makes me laugh harder. “Oh, right, I’m crazy. You just totaled your car chasing down a freaking chupacabra, and I’m crazy.”
Kelley scowls. “You know—” he starts, and then whatever he was going to say trails off as he stares into the trees. I follow his gaze.
Monsters are real, so maybe that means other bizarre stuff is real, too. Stuff like time travel. Or wishes.
I wish now. I wish to go back to the Sam I was just a few hours ago, the Sam leaving stupid Smart-N-Sav with her best friend. I wish Kelley Hamilton hadn’t come to get me tonight. I wish that I had gone home with Linds, and texted my boyfriend, and never known how truly terrifying the world could be.
I wish, and I watch as two, then four, then dozens of red eyes start to glow in the darkness.
Valerie Kemp
Stillwater
Nothing ever changes in Stillwater. Nothing. I get up every morning at the crack of dawn, in the blazing heat, and drive our pickup all over, delivering eggs and milk and whatever else my daddy feels like selling, to the good people of Stillwater, population 319.
I work my way in a circle from the edge of town, where we live, to the center. I endure all the little old ladies who like to pinch my cheek when they tell me, “Why, Pruitt Reese, you are becoming more like your daddy every day!” Like that’s a good thing.
Then I stop over at Henderson’s, top off the gas tank, and wash the sweat off my face before heading to the Stillwater Café, and Delilah. Not that she cares. The way her nose wrinkles up whenever she opens the back door for me, you’d think I’d rolled myself in manure.
To understand Delilah and me, you have to understand the Reese family—both halves. And to understand that, you have to go way back. I’m not gonna lie, it ain’t pretty. Although if you ask my folks, they’ll say they don’t know what you’re talking about. Our ancestors weren’t bad people. They didn’t break the law or nothing.
“Times was different,” my granddaddy would tell you. I s’pose he’s right, but that don’t really make it better.
Anyhow, once upon a time, a man named Jedediah Reese found himself a nice piece of land, high up on a hill overlooking a little creek, and started a farm. He had a lot of land and only a couple sons, so he did what most folks did back then. He bought himself some slaves and set to work building his fortune. And he was so successful that he founded the town of Stillwater.
Then the Civil War came. Jed was already dead by then, his land split between his two sons, Ezekiel and Thomas. They both fought for the right to feel superior and died trying. Zeke had a son, so his half of the land went to him, but Thom didn’t have any kids that outlived him. And his wife, displaying a kindness unknown to the men in my family, left it all to her housekeeper, Elisabeth Reese, outing a long-kept family secret—that Elisabeth came by the name Reese honestly. Jed was her daddy, too.
And there you have it. The saga of the Reese families. One black, one white. Neighbors and sworn enemies. At least, that’s how my folks see it. If you ask me, they spend too much time focusing on what we used to have instead of making something of ourselves now.
Delilah, Elisabeth’s six times great-granddaughter, is the brightest thing in this whole town. And even though I’m supposed to hate her, I can’t help but notice. Even when she turns her nose up and walks right past me like I’m not her seventh half-cousin once removed or whatever. Like I’m nothing at all.
Today’s no different. She pulls the door open and steps back, her pretty brown eyes all scrunched up like just the sight of me is painful. I find myself fumbling for the right words and staring at her shoes, like always.
Delilah sighs. “Just put it in the back,” she says as she leaves me to haul in my stuff, and she opens the walk-in refrigerator.
She’s wearing a red Stillwater High T-shirt under her apron today. It brings out the little bits of auburn in her long, dark curls. Most people probably think her hair is plain black, but that’s ’cause they don’t pay attention. When the light catches it just right, you can see a whole rainbow’s worth of colors in it.