The Devouring (3 page)

“Okay.”

Henry kissed his sister on the cheek and lay back, pulling the covers up to his chin.

“Good night, Reg.”

“Good night. Sweet dreams.”

When Reggie walked back to her room, it felt colder. Aaron looked ghoulish in the candlelight; his face seemed waxy, and shadows filled his eye sockets. Her heart quickened when he pulled a jar from the backpack beside him. A dark shape crawled about inside it.

“He okay?” Aaron asked.

“Henry? He’s fine. Just a little spooked by the story.”

“Me, too.” He lifted the jar to her as if proposing a toast. “Ready?”

“No. But this is the only night to do it.” Reggie closed her eyes, gritted her teeth, and stuck out her hand. The jar lid scraped as Aaron unscrewed it. “So
do
it.”

Something prickly stepped onto her palm. It moved slowly at first, exploring the hollows of her knuckles as it wandered up her fingers.

Pointy legs skirted over her thumb. Reggie flinched.

“Open your eyes,” said Aaron. “Face your fear.”

Reggie peeked. The face of her fear was a wolf spider with a swollen body and bristling legs. It was nearly the width of her wrist.

“Oh, God.” Reggie cringed. As if the spider could feel her fear, it scuttled up her arm in a matter of seconds.

“Time?” she demanded.

“Forty-five to go,” said Aaron, glancing at the stopwatch in his hand. “Forty . . .”

Reggie clenched her eyes shut. She felt the spider crawl up her neck and into her hair, the gorged abdomen dragging across her scalp. Now the crown of her head, then down onto her forehead. Her stomach lurched and her skin crawled, as if both were trying to squirm away from her body.

Its legs brushed past her brows and stopped on the tip of her nose. She wanted to scream, but her throat constricted. All that came out was a weak rattle.

“Five ... four ... three ... two ... one. Done!” shouted Aaron.

“Get it off! Get it off!” Reggie shrieked, swiping the spider off her nose. It landed on the rug and scrambled off into a corner before Aaron could grab it. Reggie jumped around her room and brushed at her face, still feeling the tiny legs on her cheek.

“Great, now that thing’s loose in my room,” she muttered, once she had calmed down a bit.

“It will probably have spider babies in your sock drawer,” said Aaron brightly. “So, are you a Vour?”

“Don’t think so.” Reggie shivered. “But then again, if I were a Vour, how would you know?”

“This is true.” Aaron poked Reggie’s forehead. “What did you do with my loser friend, you Vour bastard?”

“Still ... hungry ... must ... eat ... more ... fear ... ” Reggie grabbed Aaron’s wrist and dragged him down the stairs to the back porch, her laughter drowning in the howling wind.

Squeak — squeak — squeak.

General Squeak ran around and around in his metal wheel. Sometimes he would skitter about all night, making all sorts of little noises, but Henry liked knowing he had a friend with him in the dark.

Especially tonight.

Outside, the blizzard raged. Gusts of falling snow swirled against the windowpanes like ghosts seeking escape from the cold. The house quaked beneath their wails.

Henry pulled the blanket over his head and covered his ears. Why hadn’t he told Reggie to close the blinds? Think of something good. She’d said to think of something good.

Henry closed his eyes and tried to imagine all the things he liked about winter: his snowboard, hot chocolate, Christmas presents, Reggie taking him sledding . . .

Reggie ... why couldn’t he hear her through the vent connecting their rooms?

Another wail, louder this time. Closer. Henry poked his head out from under the covers; his panicked gaze darted around the room.

The blue glow of his penguin night-light, usually so comforting, had the opposite effect tonight. Everything looked submerged, crystallized — frozen. Even Kappy the Koala, his favorite stuffed animal, had a sinister air. The bear’s deformed shadow, a long inhuman shape lunging across the floor, seemed to be cast by some other malevolent thing.

Henry remembered the story of Jeremiah: how he was left alone on Sorry Night, terrified in the dark, with the glow of a single lantern at his feet. The Vour had come to him like a moth to the flame.

The night-light flickered.

When dark creeps in and eats the light . . .

His breath came faster.

Another icy gale howled outside, and the walls shivered around him. The night-light flared briefly and then, with a sharp buzzing crackle, it died. Winter night swallowed the room. Henry trembled, alone in the dark.

He crawled out of bed and felt his way to the door.

“Reggie?” he called out.

He opened his door and then crept down the hallway, feeling along the walls. Henry hurried to Reggie’s door and pushed it open. Three black candles burned on the nightstand, their flames mere pinpricks of light in an empty room.

“Reggie? Aaron?”

No one answered.

The window’s shutters banged and rattled, and a frigid draft snuffed out the candles’ meager light. He ran back to his own bedroom and threw himself into bed, burying himself in blankets. He choked on his breath.

Reggie, Aaron — they were gone.

Bury your fears on Sorry Night . . .

He wanted his mother, but she was gone, too.

Think of something good, Reggie had said. A good time you had, or a favorite place, or somebody you love. Henry squeezed his eyes shut and tried to remember the day his family went to the carnival. He thought of cotton candy sweetness dissolving on his tongue, of waving to his parents from the carousel, of winning Kappy the Koala from the water-gun game, of his mother’s dark hair shining in the July sunlight . . .

“Why did you leave us?” he whispered, tears nestling in the corners of his lips. “Come back, Mommy. Please come back.”

Only the weeping wind answered his pleas, flooding him with fear, chilling his thoughts, and coagulating into something black and dead — until something alive and hungry pulled him toward sleep.

The snow continued to swirl against the window, but the mournful gusts came less frequently now. The storm was passing. The soft melody of a carnival calliope played in the distance.

For in the winter’s darkest hours . . .

The doorknob turned. The bedroom door opened just enough to let in a slant of the dull orange hall light, and a cool draft carried with it the aroma of buttered popcorn and powdered sugar. Henry pulled the covers tightly around him.

“Reggie?”

There was no answer. All was still. Then a figure stood in the doorway. Her long brown curls, wide blue eyes, and gleaming white smile all seemed so real and wonderfully alive.

Comes the feasting of the Vours . . .

“Mommy?”

Soundlessly, she crossed the wood floor and sat in her familiar spot on his bed. Her thin, elegant arm reached for the lamp on his nightstand, and the metal chain chinked against the ceramic post.

Henry gazed at his mother’s beautiful face in the lamplight. She was here. He wiped his tear-filled eyes.

“Mommy, is it really you?”

“It’s me, sweet boy. You called to me and I’ve come.”

The voice was hers, the face was hers, the hair and the smile and the smell were hers. It was
her.
Henry clutched his mother fiercely, burying his face in her breast. But the deeper he pressed into her, the more he shivered.

No one can see it, the life they stole . . .

“You’re cold, Mommy.” Henry sobbed, digging into her clothes, trying to feel the warmth of her body. “You’re so cold.”

“I am, sweetheart. Very cold. But I’ll be warm again soon.” She coiled her arms around Henry’s quivering body.

The bulb in the lamp faded as a cold wind sighed through the room. Frost spider-webbed across the window, jagged icy cuts interlacing over blackness.

“Am I dreaming, Mom?” He flailed in the wintry darkness, grasping for heat and some small promise of love. “I don’t want to be dreaming. I’m so scared . . .”

“I know. But I’m here with you, Henry. I’ll always be here.” Her ivory skin rippled like water, and inky tendrils of cold black smoke oozed from her nostrils and mouth. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

Your body’s here but not your soul . . .

Henry closed his eyes and let the darkness in.

Reggie dragged the cover off the hot tub on her back deck as Aaron watched. The newly fallen snow’s weight made it a more laborious task than usual, but at last it tumbled aside. A billowing cloud of steam rolled from the water’s surface and swirled around them. The tub’s water heater still worked, but the bubble-jets had failed months ago. It was one of the many things Reggie’s dad hadn’t had time to fix since her mom had left. In the darkness, the water in the tub seemed black. The whole thing looked like a giant cauldron.

The snowstorm had mostly blown over, but the air remained sharp and dry; the hot tub’s steam did nothing to lessen the chill. Overhead, a starless sky closed in the world like a tomb.

“It’s freezing out here, Aaron. You sure you want to do this?”

“I’m not chickening out.” He already felt ridiculous, wearing nothing but rubber flip-flops, Hawaiian-print swim trunks, and a thick terry-cloth robe of Reggie’s. Even though his shivering had little to do with the cold, he wouldn’t back down.

“Okay, then. Ready?”

Aaron nodded. He kicked off the flip-flops and shrugged off the robe, hoping the night masked not only his pale body but also his surging terror. If Reggie had let a huge spider crawl on her for one minute, he could stay underwater for just as long. He climbed onto the edge of the tub and plunged in his feet. Its bathwater temperature was much warmer than the air, but gooseflesh crawled across his skin nonetheless. The wet seeped up Aaron’s swim trunks as he lowered himself in. Reggie took out the stopwatch.

“You can do it,” she said. She held the watch up. “Ready ... and ... go!”

Aaron took a deep breath and sank into the water.

As it enveloped him, he heard his heart pounding in his ears. The memory of his seventh birthday came surging back: he’d been wading in Noe Lake, searching for crawdads, and had lost his footing on an algae-covered stone at the edge of a steep descent. In a moment he’d slipped into the deeper water; as he thrashed about, he had caught his foot between rocks on the lake’s floor. Aaron remembered the panic, water filling his mouth and his nostrils.

He opened his eyes and looked up. Where was Reggie? He couldn’t see her. The water was crushing him, seeping in through his ears, his lips, his nose. His lungs burned and his body convulsed. The roar of submersion pounded in his head, and he felt himself spinning. Soon he would involuntarily gasp for air and find none. There was no up or down. There was only the black water. It was deeper than the ocean, darker than the grave. It was stronger than him. It would come rushing in; it would flood his lungs, pressing on him from the inside until he burst.

Panicked and helpless, Aaron opened his mouth and a slug of water filled his throat. He gagged and convulsed in a desperate attempt to draw a breath. But already his body was drowning, bloating, dying the horrific death his mind had played out so many times in his mind. His fear froze him and he sank to the bottom, paralyzed.

Abruptly, his body ripped upward and burst through the surface. He flailed and splashed with his eyes rolled back in his head, still suffocating.

“Aaron!”

Reggie dragged him from the tub, and Aaron dropped to his knees, vomiting a jet of water and bile onto the ground.

“Breathe!”

He coughed and spat, hunched up in a ball, shaking more from terror than the cold. Reggie knelt beside him and patted his back.

“Are you okay?” Reggie asked.

Aaron did not answer. He stood weakly, his body trembling. Reggie wrapped the robe around him and led him back inside. He sat down heavily on a kitchen chair. Reggie hurried through the darkened house to the living room and returned with a blanket. When she flicked the kitchen light switch, nothing happened.

“Shoot. The storm knocked out the electricity.” She set the blanket on Aaron’s lap. “Talk to me.”

“I’ll live.” He wrapped the blanket around himself. “But I’m never going to be a deep-sea diver, no matter what they tell me on Career Day.”

Reggie dug a flashlight from one of the kitchen drawers while Aaron went to put on dry clothes. When he came back, his backpack was slung over his shoulder, and the color had returned to his face.

“So. Did I make it?” he asked.

Reggie avoided his eyes.

“That’s really not important —”

“Come on, how long? So I didn’t make a full minute. Fifty-five seconds? Fifty?”

“Aaron, I —”

“For crying out loud, Reg.” Aaron grabbed the stopwatch from her before she could stop him. He peered at the numbers on the display:
0:19.

“Nineteen seconds? That’s it?” Aaron cried. “That’s pathetic!”

“At least you’re not a Vour.”

“No, still pussy-boy Aaron.”

“Aaron, it’s not a big deal. Just a stupid game.”

“I need to go.”

Reggie didn’t want to make it worse for him. “Okay. Call me tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Aaron strode out the front door, and it banged shut behind him.

As soon as he was gone, Reggie clicked on the flashlight and headed upstairs. The hallway was much colder than downstairs, and as she passed Henry’s room she felt a cold draft underneath his door.
Squeak-squeak-squeak
went the hamster wheel inside. She opened the door and approached Henry’s bed. He slept peacefully.

“He’s got to be freezing.” Reggie pulled a wool blanket from the foot of the bed.

She shivered and looked around — it felt like someone else was in the room. A sweep of the flashlight’s beam illuminated little toy racecars scattered on the floor and snowboarder posters tacked to the walls. Kappy the Koala stared blankly from his perch on the toy box. On the nightstand sat the picture of the family at the Bottle Hill fairgrounds. Reggie picked it up. It was one of the last photos taken of the four of them before Mom had left. Now it was just she and Henry and General Squeak.