Jake and the Giant Hand (3 page)

G-R-A-B

J
ake
was riding down the laneway. His grandpa hadn't let him go until after dinner was over (hot dogs) and they had done the dishes, but finally it was time. Jake had a sleeping bag and extra clothes in his backpack, plus his grandpa gave him a flashlight, a box of cookies, and three cans of pop. For the long night ahead, he said.

His grandpa also made him take Gus along, which was a little weird since Gus never went anywhere without Grandpa. Jake had Gus on a leash and was leading him beside the bike. The old hound dog wasn't happy about going with Jake. It took a lot of coaxing with dog treats. Jake had a pocketful for later.

He and Gus pulled up into the Cuthberts' front yard. He leaned his bike against the fence and led Gus along. He knocked on the front door and jumped back when it opened right away. Mr. Cuthbert said, “They're already back there, Jake. I'll let them know to meet you halfway. Just start walking back through the field to the woods.”

Then he shut the door.

Jake nodded. “Okay,” he said to the closed door. He and Gus started walking slowly through the field behind the house.

It was getting dark, and it was really quiet. Jake couldn't hear anything. In the city, there was always something to hear: trucks grinding their gears, emergency sirens, kids laughing down the street, people shouting, dogs barking. But it wasn't like that here. It was quiet, too quiet. There weren't any birds singing, or any cows mooing, or any sign of life at all. He looked across the field and saw the light shining in his grandpa's kitchen window.

It made him feel a little better. The stars were coming out, and a quarter moon was rising. It was a beautiful night. He and Gus made it to the edge of the forest, then he stopped to wait.

He couldn't see a pathway into the woods. Mr. Cuthbert had said he would let the twins know to come and get him, but he didn't say
how
he was going to do that. Jake had no idea where the cabin was, so he'd have to trust that they'd come to find him.

It was really dark now. Jake sat on his sleeping bag and rubbed Gus's head. The old dog smelled terrible, but suddenly Jake was kind of glad Gus was there.

Then there
were
tiny noises in the bushes.

The grass
did
sway in the moonlight.

The air
was
alive with the smell of damp, rotting leaves.

There was NO WAY Jake was going to think about the swamp …

“… AAAHHH!”

A
hand
had grabbed Jake's shoulder!

The Giant Hand

I
t
took Jake a while to stop shrieking. It took a longer while for his heart to stop pounding out of his ribcage, too. Kate was laughing, but he didn't think it was all that funny. He tried not to look mad.

“Man! You guys are easy to sneak up on! What's that old hound dog for, anyway! He didn't even smell me. You look scared!” Kate said.

Gus wagged his tail and licked Kate's hand. Stupid dog didn't even bark. Jake felt dumb. But he had to admit, he was happy to see Kate, even if she
had
scared him half to death. She turned on a flashlight then led him along a winding, dark path through the woods to the cabin. No one would ever be able to find it if they didn't know
exactly
where to look.

Jake gulped.

As they got near, he could see it was a nice cabin, though. It looked really cozy, with warm light spilling out into the dark night.

Suddenly, a creepy white grin leapt out at Jake. He gasped and hesitated. Leaning up against the cabin wall under the window was a huge white skull and antlers. It stared and grinned at Jake in the light from the window.

Kate pointed at it. “That's a moose skull and antlers Chris and I found back in the swamp last year. Dad is going to help us hang it above the door. It's really old, since it's bleached so white from the sun.”

A skull?

Jake looked closely at the dried bone: so white and strong. He knocked on it. It sounded solid.

“Yeah, that'll look great above the door,” he said, trying to sound impressed. The moose skull was a little gruesome, and it came from the
swamp
. The huge skull stared at him with empty eye sockets. Jake pretended to like it, but he hoped it didn't give him nightmares.

It had been alive once. How did the moose die? Did it get stuck in the swampy water and dragged down into the muck? Jake made himself stop thinking about the moose skull.

Poor moose!

He had to think about something else. The cabin had patterned wood all around it, which made it look like something out of a storybook. He tried to change the subject.

“That looks nice,” Jake said, pointing at the patterned wood. Kate stopped on the step. “Oh yeah, it took Dad and me and Chris ages to cut it all. That was the hardest part. Dad said he had a cabin just like this when he was a kid. He calls it ‘gingerbread.'”

“A …
gingerbread
house in the woods?” Jake said, a little weakly.

Kate laughed. “Yeah, I guess you could say that. We've got Hansel and Gretel inside!”

Jake made a laughing noise, but he didn't feel like laughing.

Kate opened the cabin door. The lights were on, and Chris was making something in a frying pan on a stove.

It smelled fantastic.

“S'mores!” Chris said happily. “Do you like chocolate and marshmallows and graham crackers, Jake?”

Jake smiled. At least the inside of the cabin seemed normal.

“Yeah, of course.” He dropped his backpack in a corner, and Gus flopped down and fell asleep.

They ate delicious s'mores until Kate finally said it was time for ghost stories and unrolled her sleeping bag in the middle of the floor. Chris and Jake unrolled their sleeping bags, too.

“Where are the beds?” Jake asked.

“We don't have any beds or anything in here yet, we just sleep on the floor,” Chris said. “We'll get furniture and beds and a table and stuff one day, I guess.” He shrugged.

Kate grinned and added, “It's perfect for telling ghost stories, though!”

Gus rolled over but didn't wake up. He was probably lost in hound-dog dreams about chasing rabbits. His whole body twitched. Jake wished he were far away in dreamland somewhere, too.

Kate switched off the overhead light and brought out a flashlight. Chris turned off the little stove and the cabin got dark and spooky. The flashlight beam bounced off the walls, making everything look jiggly and strange. Jake sat on his sleeping bag and pulled out his own flashlight. He was glad … so very glad … that his grandpa made him take it along.

“Okay, this is a true story … it happened around here a long time ago.”

“Is it about the little old lady and the swamp?” Jake blurted out. He really didn't mean to, but he couldn't help it.

Kate shook her head. “No, that's
last
year's story. Besides, everyone knows
that
story isn't real. This story I'm going to tell you IS real. It's about a farmer's field … and a giant hand,” she began.

Chris lay on his sleeping bag with his hands under his head, looking at the ceiling. He guffawed. “Oh, not this story Kate, it's stupid! It's not even scary!”

Kate scowled at her brother. “It's true, Chris. And it's
creepy
. Now quiet and listen.”

Jake was more interested in creepy than scary. His mind started to wander to swamp creatures, and he sat up straighter.

Kate went on in a quiet, whispery voice. “Okay. This is a true story, and it happened a long time ago right around here. One day a farmer and his son woke up to a terrible sound. It got louder and louder. They were too scared to get out of bed, it was so loud. It was like chainsaws, like a million worker bees, like a sound that you recognized but didn't want to be real. They tiptoed downstairs … the noise was coming from the kitchen! Slowly they opened the creaky old kitchen door … and peeked inside….”

Kate's flashlight flickered on her face as she spoke. Her eyes looked dark, her forehead huge and weird. Jake clutched his own flashlight, his eyes wide.

“Do you know what was in there? The
grossest
thing you can imagine,” she breathed.

“Nnn … n-no. What was it?” Jake whispered.

“FLIES! Millions of huge, HUGE flies! They came in the open window. There were so many flies, the farmer and his son couldn't open their eyes, and they couldn't open their mouths to scream for help. The flies were everywhere, buzzing in their faces, sticking to their skin, crawling in their ears, clinging to the ceilings and walls.”

“Gross,” Jake said in a tiny squeak.

Flies?

“Yeah, and these weren't any ordinary flies, either. These were giant flies, like butterflies, like bats, like birds! WAY TOO BIG to be normal. So the farmer and his son took one look and slammed the kitchen door and ran outside. Screaming. The air was filled with buzzing like a million chainsaws, it was driving them crazy. But then they saw something even grosser….” Kate paused. She grinned and the light from the flashlight bounced off her teeth and forehead, making her eyes look huge and empty, like sockets. She looked like a skull come to life.

Jake tried not to think of the horrible moose skull propped up against the wall outside. He stared at her, barely breathing. His flashlight started to shake, and the light on the ceiling trembled like it was crawling … with flies! He couldn't sit still.

Chris was lying on his sleeping bag, looking up at the wooden beams in the ceiling. He seemed bored.

Kate went on, dropping her voice really low. “They
smelled
it first. A terrible reek that made them gag. They put their sleeves over their noses and mouths.” She lifted her arm and covered her nose.

“Then they
heard
the buzzards and crows, screaming and shrieking.” Kate covered her ears, like a loud noise was hurting her.

“Then they
saw
it. Up in the field. The grossest, most disgusting thing you could ever imagine … a huge lump of rotten goo. Just a giant hill of blood and gross gooey stuff.
What was it?
” Kate demanded.

Jake shook his head, his mouth open. He couldn't speak.

“The thing was rotten …
dead
. And it was
swarming
with the biggest flies you've ever seen! The farmer and his son covered their noses with scarves, their eyes with goggles, and their heads with straw hats. Then they rode their tractor into the field. Closer and closer they got … to the
thing
. Then they saw it....”

Kate paused and looked at Jake. He was barely breathing. The cabin was so dark, and quiet, and way out in the middle of the woods. No one was around to help. Anything could be out there … waiting. Any enormous, dead, gross thing.

Jake gulped, his heart pounding. “What was it?” he whispered, clutching his flashlight to his chest.

“It was a
giant … corpse … hand.…
” Kate whispered back, her voice cracking. “With five HUGE fingers, each as big as a tractor. It was just like a normal human hand, except it was as big as a shed. And it was rotting, and it reeked. White bones stuck out where the flesh was missing. The buzzards and crows circled and dive-bombed … but the worst part …”

“Yeah?” Jake breathed.
What could possibly be worse than a huge rotting hand crawling with giant flies?

“It was wearing a
WEDDING RING
!” Chris shouted in a loud voice that made Jake and Kate jump. Gus woke up and whined, wagging his tail down low, and slipped over to Jake's side. Jake put his arm over Gus's back and stroked him. He was glad to have something to hug; it hid his shaking hands.

“A
wedding ring
? That's
so
creepy!” Jake said.

Chris ignored him and carried on in his loud, out-of-place voice. “Yes, a wedding ring. It was huge and it had a message engraved in it. It said, ‘
To M Love L on Our Wedding Day
.'”

Jake looked at Kate, who nodded. “That's what they say,” she said solemnly.

It was the single weirdest thing Jake had ever heard.

A wedding ring?

Jake was about to ask how anyone knew what was engraved on the ring, but Chris interrupted him. He was laughing and shaking his head.

“No one believes that story, Kate. A, because it's impossible, and B, because it's just stupid. Where did the giant hand come from? How did it end up in the field? What was it doing there? And where's the proof? Honestly, you think up the stupidest things, I don't even know where you get this stuff.”

Kate looked hurt. “I'm not making it up! Mrs. Cody, the librarian in town, told us about it at a ghost walk last year. It really happened, like a hundred years ago or something, right around here. Sometimes weird things just happen. There doesn't always have to be a reason, or proof, for something weird to happen. It was just some strange thing that happened to a farmer around here, that's all.”

“Okay, what happened to the hand then? If there was a giant hand in some farmer's field, where did the bones go? Why didn't all the news stations in the world come to town to report it? How come
you're
the one telling me about it, and not some important historian?” Jake was glad that Chris was making so much sense. It was a creepy story, but if you thought about it, it didn't seem
real
. It was pretty far-fetched.

Kate shrugged as she spoke. “Well, Mrs. Cody said that the farmer and his son dug a huge hole and buried the thing. They just buried the horrible hand right there, in the field. No one made a big deal about it because they buried it and kept it quiet. And when anyone asked, they denied it ever existed.”

Then two really weird things happened. Gus started barking, which made Jake and Kate almost jump out of their skins.

Then
something
knocked on the window.

IT WAS A GIANT, ROTTING HAND!