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JW
The Past
TONIGHT IS HELL NIGHT. The one night a month that I, my brothers, and all the other kids in Sweet Haven walk through Hell and come out on the other side broken and feeling lost. It’s a night that the adults change from sweet and loving parents, to the monstrous evil that normally lays dormant.
Tonight isn’t the usual Hell Night though. It’s not the kids who are suffering the horrors and pain of being forced to do things they don’t want to do. It’s the adults who are screaming and crying in fear. It’s the adults who are begging and fighting against the hands that are holding them down. Tonight, the adults are walking through Hell.
It’s late. Like after four in the morning. The official Hell Night, or what the adults call The Gathering, ended a couple of hours ago. I’m sore all over. My brother was rough earlier. More so than normal.
Only wearing a t-shirt and boxers, my hair still wet from my shower, and barefoot, I creep along the side of my house. I make sure to stay in the shadows.
My heart pounds in my chest and nerves make my stomach feel queasy. I whip my head around when I hear a scream a few houses down. It’s an adult. A woman. I briefly wonder who it is. I push the thought to the back of my head because I don’t have time to think about it. I need to get to my brothers. We’re all supposed to meet Mae and Dale behind The Hill.
I round the front side of my house, but come to a stop when I see dark figures, a bunch of them, stalk up the steps onto my porch. I back up and dart behind our neighbor’s, Mr. and Mrs. Sanders’, house.
I’m just rounding the corner when I hear a loud bang and shouts come from inside my house. I pant as I start running, looking behind me to make sure no one’s spotted me and is following.
The night opens up to more screams and yells. Suddenly, I’m falling, and my hands go in front of me to catch myself before my face smashes into the ground. The grass is wet with dew and my nails dig into the blades as I push myself up. I turn and slowly walk back to what I tripped over. It’s a body. Bending down, I notice it’s Mr. Sanders. Something dark is on the front of his shirt just below the collar. I can’t see the color, but from the way his eyes are open and sightlessly staring up at the sky, I’ve no doubt it’s blood. He’s dead.
A thrill rushes through me. I’m glad he’s dead. I just wish I was the one brave enough to have killed him.
My feet squish in the cool wet grass as I leave Mr. Sanders on the ground. I stop behind a shed when I see a short figure up ahead hunched over behind a tree. The figure turns their head, and I recognize the face from the moonlight. Bending low, I jog over to my brother, Judge.
“Where’re the others?” I whisper once I’m at his side.
Without turning his head, he answers in a low voice. “I’m not sure, but I’ve got a guess.” Reaching back, he grabs my shirt. “Come on.”
He pulls me behind him, but there’s no need. I’d follow him anyway.
We’re forced to stop again when someone comes barreling out of the shadows in front of us and runs toward a car. They get the door open before a deep voice rings out.
“Halt! This is the FBI! Put your hands behind your head and get on your knees!”
The light from inside the car reveals Noah Vincent’s face. He’s one of the younger adults, and a friend of my brother, Trey. I remember when he used to fight Hell Night. A couple years ago, that changed. Now he willingly joins in. Whatever happens to him, I hope it hurts.
I don’t get a chance to see if he does as the FBI orders, because Judge and I are sprinting again. Instead of heading toward The Hill like we should be, we’re running the opposite way. Judge doesn’t have to tell me where we’re going. There’s only one reason we would be going this way. To get Emo and Trouble.
Emo has been acting more volatile than usual lately, and I know it’s because he’s still torn up over the death of Rella, Trouble’s sister. He told us he thought he heard her scream last night. That’s not possible. We saw her ghostly-white body. We saw the blood soaking into the wood of the gazebo beneath her. There’s no way anyone could live with the amount of blood she lost.
We’re only a couple of houses away from Trouble’s when a familiar scream has me halting in my tracks. It’s my mother’s. A moment later, I hear my father bellow. I don’t stop because I’m concerned with what’s happening to them. I stop because I want to take a minute to relish in their pain. I want to soak up the sound of their fear and helplessness, because they’ve been the cause of mine for as long as I can remember. Nothing that they’re going through could come even close to what I’ve endured.
“JW,” Judge hisses a few feet away from me. “We gotta go.”
We run in the opposite direction of where my parents are, but their sounds of torment follow me. It’s a sound I hope I will always carry with me. Even after my brothers and I leave this place of Hell behind.
JW
TOSSING MY PHONE IN THE passenger seat, I flip my lights on, pull out of the access road, and haul ass after the cherry red convertible that’s going sixty-eight in a fifty-five zone.
Damn crazy idiots.
I gain on the
car, and either they haven’t spotted me behind them or they just don’t give a fuck, because their lead foot is still very much on the gas pedal. Irritation has my hands choking the steering wheel when they don’t slow down once we hit Malus’s outer limits. What in the hell is so Goddamn important that they couldn’t get to where they’re going a minute or two later?
Thinking about the people walking the streets and the kids playing on the sidewalks only a mile away makes me want to kick the dickhead’s face in, then issue them a ticket. Or better yet, toss their ass in a cell and let them stew for a night or two.
They have a Texas license plate, but I don’t recognize the car, so they can’t be from around here. Which is a whole other potential problem.
Outsiders aren’t welcome in Malus.
Flipping the switch on the control box on my dashboard, I blip my siren a couple of times, just in case the person hasn’t spotted me behind them. Their head pops up, and I can barely make out a pair of sunglasses in their rearview mirror.
Thankfully, and wisely, they begin to slow down. I cruise to a stop behind the car just a few blocks away from the sheriff’s office, which is convenient if things happen to go sour.
Climbing out of my truck, I approach the car slowly. Once I’m at the back fender, I notice the small hands gripping the steering wheel. Feminine hands. Ones with fingernails painted a bright red. The woman’s head is facing forward, but she tilts her head to the side once I’m at her door.
Huge black sunglasses that cover half of her face stare up at me. Her lips match the color of her nails. Her hair is in a scarf, but I still see red strands peeking out of the edges of the silky material.
“License and registration, please,” I request, an irritated bite to my tone.
