9111 Sharp Road (5 page)

“Come on, let’s go!” Audrey pleaded.
I slammed my locker and followed
her
down the hall to room 15.
The halls were decorated with “Welcome Back” banners that made me sick. Seriously, do they have to rub it in that we
were in for another
nine months of suffering?

“Shoot, Audrey, I forgot my
binder
!” I quickly
turned around. I couldn’t go to Mr. Hatch
’s class without being prepared.

Audrey
called after me
,
saying I was going to be reeeeaaaaallllyyy late, and Mr. Hatch was going to give me fifteen weeks of detention
and make
me write 200 sentences an hour about h
ow I will not be late to class. I ignored her and continued back to
my locker
.

I
grabbed my
binder
just as the bell rang. It was a loud, ear-piercing wail from a speaker right above my
locker
. I ran to room 15 as fast as I could, which apparently wasn’t fast enough for Mr. Hatch, who stood in the door
,
slapping a
ruler
into his left hand.
Go ahead, hit me,
I thought.

“You’re late,” he said. He punctuated each word with a slap of the
ruler
.

“I had to get my binder,” I said under my breath, too low for him to hear.

“Excuse me?”

“I was getting my binder.” I held it up.

“
Next time, you get a detention
,” he sa
id and let me in the classroom.

The
room
was full, at least thirty or thirty-five students
, a large class for such a small school population
.
School funding,
I thought
almost facetiously
.
Should have collected box top
s and pop can tabs this summer.

In spite of everything I’d been through recently, a smile crept across my lips as
I
found a seat in the back, near the window. Mr. Hatch
introduced
himself to everyone
.

I wasn’t
really
paying attention to any of what Mr. Hatch was saying. Instead, I stared out the window at the green
grass and
the
blue, cloudless sky.
I felt exhausted. I hadn’t slept well in weeks. My eyes were heavy, and as I sat there staring out the window, it took all of my concentration to
stay awake.

Then,
Mr. Hatch was
going on about a fish
ing trip he took
with his son
that
summer. His son, who was
only
four
years old
, caught the biggest fish
Mr. Hatch
had
ever seen.

After several minutes
, I could no longer keep my head up and my eyes open. I don’t remember exactly when I fell asleep, but I could hear a faraway voice, almost like a dream, say,
“Ms. Gates,
would you care joining us in the land of the living
?”

The answer to that question was a resounding NO as I fell into sleep’s hold.

Chapter 5

My eyes snapped open, and I found myself standing
in
the field
of long grass
with that house at 9111 Sharp Road looming in the near distance against a full moon hanging just above the tree tops
.
The nighttime air blew softly against my skin. It felt so real. The only thing missing was the sound of the nightly insects, but that was par for the course out here.

How did I get here?
What was going on?

I looked around me. I was standing
in the clearing where Lori and I had seen that
tomb stone
.

M
y heart raced. I was terrified.

I could hear the
screeching cries
in the night
.
Were
t
hose bat-like creatures coming to eat me
?
Or perhaps turn me into one of them?

I didn’t know what to do, but I
knew that
pani
cking would only make it worse.

I dove into the long
weeds
and lay on my belly with my hands laced behind my head.

My eyes were closed, and I prayed that I would wake up in Mr. Hatch’s room and all of this would just be a dream.

There was something approaching from behind, the sound of its footsteps bore ever closer.

Whoever or whatever it was
stopped
right in next to me and just stood there.

Then I felt hands grab me around my waist and lift me to my feet. My eyes were closed. I didn’t want to look into one of those bat faces again.

“
Look at me, Amanda,
”
a familiar voice said as he turned me to face him. Dad? It was my dad’s voice! My eyes flew open…and what I saw was the man in the old fashioned clothing, except he looked solid, real, alive.

One thing was certain, this was my father.

“Amanda,” he said
and let go
. I was standing
on wobbly
legs.
“Amanda, I need to show you something.”

I couldn’t speak. Show me what?

“Amanda. Do you know where we are?”

Of course I knew. I nodded.

He took off his hat.
“Amanda,
y
ou need to come with me now
.
Come on.”

I followed him because I didn’t know what else to do, but I would soon regret it as he walked
through the long grass
and pointed to a hole in the ground
.
“That is the well.”

“What?
What do you mean the well?
”
I said, finally finding my voice.

“
This
is where the
c
hiroptera
dwell.
”

“The chiro-what?”

“The bat creatures,” he said with a smirk. “Here, take my hands,” he said, extending both han
d
s. “I want to touch my daughter again.”

Instead of reaching for him, I took a couple steps back. “Why did you have to die?
How could you leave us like that?”

He looked taken aback, as if he
weren’t
expecting such a strong reaction from his daughter. How could he not have? I didn’t know if he was some sort of figment of my imagination, as in this was a dream, or if he was a ghost visiting me in some sort of hallucination,
but I was upset with him as if he were still alive and had just abandoned us.

In that moment, I hated him. I hated him for leaving, and I hated him for tearing our family apart. Mom was de
pressed in the most serious way, n
ever leaving that rocking chair
and wasting away to nothing.

“When you died, we all died,” I said. I didn’t even try to hold back the tears, just as I didn’t even try to hold back my anger. “Mom has given up on life, and Lori and I are terrified.”

“I know, dear,” he said in a somber tone. He reached out and put a hand on my shoulder.
“I understand what you’re going through.”

“No, you don’t! If you understood, you wouldn’t have died!”

“Amanda—” he started before a loud screech cut him off. “They’re coming. They can’t know I spoke to you.
Keep
your sister
safe. You’re the only one who can.
Just remember.
”
He looked thoughtful for a moment, and then continued, “Whatever you do, do not listen to the voices, even if some of them sound like me.”

The next thing I knew, he was pushing me into the hole. “Hey!”

I landed waist deep in
water that
smelled
terrible
, like sewage.
The ground beneath the water was muddy and slippery. The well its
elf was about four feet wide
.

“Help!” I cried, but the only response I heard was the echo of my own voice mixed with drips of water.
The walls were grimy and covered in slippery filth. There was no way I would ever be able to climb out of there.
How I longed to be back at school
. I would
give
Mr. Hatch’s
gloating, egotistical, pompous
,
fat head a kiss if I could only get out of this well and back into the classroom.

The
moonlight
was gone;
my father was gone;
I was alone
in the dark.

Except, I wasn’t.

I could hear the screeching of those creatures above me, coming closer. Soon
,
they would be upon me, and—if my dad was correct—see me in their home.

But as the screeches approached to the point of being almost directly upon me, they ceased. Were
they leaving?
Or were they going to attack me by surprise?

Several
seconds
of absolute silence
went
by. They were the most agonizing seconds of my life.

Then, without warning, t
he water started
churning, splashing, and spraying
around me
in all directions
. Something was just below the
surface, swimming around me i
n a counter-clock-wise fashion.

I
tried not to panic
.
I really did,
I could feel myself being pulled down into the muck. I needed to get out of there.

“Help!” I cried and
flailed
my arms about. “Help!”

I was going to be eaten alive if I didn’t drown first
. My vision blurred as
blood
pounded
behind
m
y eyes. I looked to either side, searching for something—anything—on which I could grab hold and maybe make an escape.

N
othing but those slimy bricks.

“Someone help me!
Please help!
”

And then something reached up and pulled me under and….

I
woke up at my desk
.

The bright fluorescent lights of the classroom burned my
eyes as
I cried out in shock. My shoes and pants were wet and drip
ping a puddle underneath me
.

A
wave of giggles ripped through the classroom, turning quickly into roars of laughter. I had no idea what was so funny. I was scared. Terrified
, actually
. What had just happened?
What were
all my classmates
pointing
and
staring
at?

Oh no!
I thought as I
realize
d
why they were laughing.

“
You’re in fifth grade now, Ms. Gates. I
shouldn’t have to dress you in P
ull-ups if you’re going to sleep in
my
class
.”

My fear became embarrassment as I felt
my face tu
rning red. My blood was boiling;
my heart pound
ed
in my ears.

The laughter continued. I
was soon
getting
pelted
with spit wads and paper airplanes as I became the mockery of the entire fifth-grade class.

“The new girl
pissed her pants!”
someone cried.

“No, no, that’s not—” I tried to explain.

Even
Audrey
was
laugh
ing
. I glared at her with
tear-filled eyes, but she didn’t seem to care.
How could
she
betray me like that?

“Go to the office,
Ms. Gates
,” Mr. Hatch ordered
,
“and get a change of clothes
.
”

Chapter
6