Travel Bug (28 page)

“I’m coming,” I answered back.

“It’s your favorite,” she said.

“Spaghetti, you mean mom?”

“Yes.”

“That would be nice.”

Our family, the Hoopers has been living here in Emityville for over five years. We have some problems. Well, we have a lot of problems. Profound, unbelievable and mostly supernatural problems…! My name is Heather, my brother’s name is Henry and our little brother’s name is Herbert. For starters, our house is haunted. The people who lived there before were a family murdered by their father. Sometimes I think that even they had better odds than we do relying on our stupid Dad for safety.

“Do you want me to bake some dinner rolls?”

“Yes, mother.”

“They really make dinner special.”

“They sure do, Mom.”

So our house is haunted by evil spirits. They ask my Dad to kill us every night but he’s too worried about his favorite shows on cable TV to really notice. What other problems does our town have, you might ask? Well, let’s see. There are vampires in town who come out every night and kill people. Sometimes they make them into other vampires. Mom and Dad don’t seem to notice them either.

“Oh, honey. Do you think that your brothers would like dinner rolls, too?”

“Yes, Mom, I believe they would like them.”

I’m thirteen, my brother Henry is eleven and Herbert is eight. Why the hell wouldn’t any of us like spaghetti? That’s Mom. Worried about spaghetti but not at all concerned about vampires.

“I heard your friend Lori, died in her sleep last week. Is that true?”

“Yes, mother,” I answered my mom.

“That’s really terrible.”

“Yes, mother. That is terrible.”

Mom has such a flair for the obvious. There was a child killer in Emityville a long time ago. The folks in town burned him alive but now he comes back to life in their nightmares. He targets the ones he likes and kills them in their dreams. That is too far above Mom and Dad’s head to even ponder. They should be more aware of other immediate and natural threats. Like the killer shark that seems to come every summer to eat the tourist. The mayor leaves the beaches open. The locals don’t swim any more. The fishermen are always trying to capture this great monster shark but they never do. This is a seaside town. The shark swims in the bay and devours people! If mom and dad can’t grasp that, they won’t grasp any of the other Emityville horrors!

“Do you want apple or orange juice with dinner, sweetheart?”

“I don’t know Mom. We’ll leave that up to you.”

“Okay.”

“You know I don’t like it when you drink soda or coffee. You’re far too young to be drinking caffeine.”

“Yes, of course…”

Perhaps Mom should be more concerned that Dad drinks five or six vodka martinis every night. No. That wouldn’t be her style.

“I’m making your dad’s martini.”

“Understood…”

“You know he enjoys a drink with dinner.”

“Yes he does.”

“He thinks that my dinners are out of this world.”

Dad will drink until he literally feels out of this world. Speaking of being out of this world, mom and dad also has failed to notice that there are alien creatures from a far away galaxy who can disguise themselves as humans. The dumb tourists that the shark doesn’t get are taken away in the mother ship and harvested for food on their home planet.

“Oh, I forgot about dessert.”

“Oh really… ?”

“Just because you don’t have your easy bake oven anymore doesn’t mean you can’t help me make the best homemade chocolate cake that Emityville has ever tasted.”

Well, Mom says a lot of silly, inaccurate, ignorant and downright stupid things. One thing that you can’t say about her is that she is a bad cook. My mother can cook like nobody else in town. I just wish that she could see that the shark, the vampires and the aliens get far more human flesh than the townsfolk get grade A meat.

“Call Henry and Herbert now, honey.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll get Dad.”

Dad was too busy to eat with the rest of us right away. He was getting drunk and planning his TV watching for the rest of the weekend. It was Friday evening and that was his favorite night of the entire week. Dad was watching a horror movie marathon on one of those cable networks featuring a lot of explicit violence and sex scenes. One movie was about a great white shark that killed tourists in a small seaside town. It was first a famous book based on what happens here every summer. Another movie was about a demonically haunted house. It was a book that claimed to be a true story. Dad never noticed that we were living in the house on which the novel was based.

“Looks like some good viewing this weekend,” Dad said.

“Do those movies remind you of anything, Dad?”

“Sure.”

“What?”

“A shark and a haunted house is what they remind me of.”

I went to get Henry and found him crying. I asked him what the problem was. He said that the aliens across the street were trying to get him on board the mother ship last night. He said they wanted him to be food. The evil species thought that a demon haunted house would somehow produce tastier little boys to devour. It was funny because my brother always had video games featuring sharks, haunted houses, aliens and, of course, vampires. My Mom would watch him play and say he shouldn’t sit so darn close to the television. My father would say that young boys just like that kind of stuff.

“Heather, I was glad the aliens tried to snatch me.”

“Why?”

“The man, what’s his name, who gets you in your sleep?”

“Craven Williamson, you mean?”

“Yes. He only has one good hand, Heather. The hand that he lost in the fire was replaced by a meat hook. That’s how he gets his child victims. If the aliens weren’t coming to harvest me for food then I would have been dead meat from the hook and died in my sleep. So we’re having spaghetti?”

“We are.”

“Awesome.”

“Go downstairs now. I’ll get Herbert ready for dinner.”

“Okay,” answered Henry.

I couldn’t help but feel guilty for feeling like we had superior cute looks in our family. We all have blonde hair and no acne whatsoever. We all have beautiful green eyes and a winning smile as well. That’s why all these things want us. The aliens, the vampires, the child molester nightmare killer, the demons and dead children of this house, they all want us. I’m not sure about the shark but my guess is he probably would like to have his way with us as well.

“I’m not coming to dinner tonight,” said Herbert.

“What?” I asked.

“I don’t feel…… well……”

“I’m coming up.”

“No!”

My eight year old brother was shaking uncontrollably in his room filled with toys and games. He stood up for a moment. Herbert looked like he had been embalmed. It didn’t take long for me to guess what was up.

“They got to you, finally.”

“They have…”

“Well, at least you were brought into nocturnal eternal damnation by the master himself.”

“We should have the master over for dinner,” said Herbert.

My Dad came up the stairs. He was already very drunk and acting embarrassingly stupid. I guess we could have an intervention if danger and death were not lurking around every corner. He looked at us. Dad had bumped his head and nose and lost all sense of coordination. It wasn’t the first time or the hundredth that this happened.

“Shouldn’t you kids be getting ready for dinner?”

“Soon,” we both answered at once.

“You know, Mom has dinner rolls.”

“Yes, Dad, she already gave us a dinner roll update.”

“Are you being sarcastic?”

“Not at all, Dad,” I answered.

“Good.”

“We’ll be ready soon, dad. I promise,” said Herbert.

“Herbert, you look terrible. Son, are you on drugs?”

“No, Dad, I’m not on drugs.”

“Great to hear that, baby.”

“See you in a few, Dad,” I said.

“Hey, son, I want to ask you a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Have you been drinking?”

“No.”

“Good. See you downstairs for dinner in a few.”

“Sure.”

Dad went downstairs. I guess I can say that at least Dad is an obnoxious drunk. That’s not a good excuse but Mom’s excuse of being in constant oblivious denial is the weakest excuse of all! I am truly ashamed to be her daughter. I can’t imagine going through life that blind to reality. The only saving grace she has is that like my father their lack of comprehension of their surroundings is almost legendary. They are part of some great epic, honestly, some morality tale, no, wait, a cautionary tale to those who refuse to see what’s going on all around them.

“Honey, you need to come to dinner now,” said Mom.

“I know.”

“Herbert does as well.”

“I know.”

“Ask him if I should butter his dinner roll for him.”

“I will.”

“Klaus Shreck is coming, my sister.”

“The master of all our town’s vampires, you mean?”

“The master of vampires in a thousand towns, I mean. He is an amazing creature.”

“I’m sure.”

“Don’t mock my master, sister.”

“I won’t… why are you looking at me like that?”

“Like what?”

My brother looked like he was ravenous for blood. The midnight blood lusts would begin this very night.

“Please don’t suck my blood, Herbert.”

“Don’t worry; I will… fight my appetites for family.”

“Hey are you two kids coming to dinner soon?” Dad asked, slurring his speech.

“Of course,” I answered him.

“Swell.”

There was a pause.

“You know Mom has dinner rolls out already.”

“That’s great, Dad.”

“I think she put some butter on Herbert’s rolls.”

“Great,” I said.

“Hey, I need my youngest one now,” said my Dad. Tell him to meet me in the garage now.”

“Okay.”

Dad was hiccupping now. Herbert did not want to arouse any unwanted suspicions and went to his old man’s filthy, disorganized garage. Herbert was always pretty neat and tidy. He was almost as well organized as he was a spoiled soon to be undead brat.

“What is it, Dad?”

“Son, you really look… just terrible.”

“I’ll be okay, Dad.”

“Good, son, that’s good news.”

“What do you need?”

“Please go get that bug repellent and a broom.”

“Okay.”

“Dad’s been drinking a little and I’m embarrassed to say that my coordination isn’t that…… great.”

“Okay.”

“You see, son. That is the biggest damn mosquito I have ever seen!”

“What mosquito?”

I watched my brother from the rear window of the garage. He gasped in horror as my Dad grabbed hold of the bug spray and sprayed it on Klaus. You see he had taken the form of a bat. Just when his throat let out another terrifying scream, Dad grabbed the broom. Smack! Klaus collapsed on the front lawn. Dad ran out and repeatedly stepped on him and I mean over and over again.

“Master, I’m sorry…”

“Hey, are you on drugs?”

“What?”

“You heard me, son.”

“No, Dad, I’m not.”

“Then why the hell are you calling a mosquito master?”

“Well, I… I’m going to have dinner now.”

“Heather, I see you. Go help your mother get ready for dinner. I think she might need some help with the dinner rolls.”

“Okay, Dad, I will do that.”

Mom didn’t need help with the cooking per se. She asked me why the rocking chair in the living room kept rocking all the time by itself.

“You know, it’s the craziest thing,” she said.

“Yes, mother.”

“It just keeps moving and there isn’t anyone in it!”

“That’s because that little girl Candy. She was murdered here in the house by her father and the demons keep her prisoner. She has been rocking on that thing since I was a little girl. She used to come talk to me and you called her a make believe friend.”

“Oh, I remember when you played those games,” Mom answered.

“Can I be excused?”

“No, you cannot, Herbert,” said Mom.

“I don’t feel very well.”

“My home cooked spaghetti with extra garlic will cure that!”

“I need to leave, sister.”

“Don’t leave yet, Herbert, I’ll think of something.”

My silly brother wanted to be ironic by inviting the creature over who would destroy his very soul. That was simply amateur irony. Serious irony was having a drunken idiot of a father who mistakes a much feared creature of the night for a big mosquito. Then that’s not enough for my absurd family. No. Mom has to put a special ingredient into dinner that would kill her son. I mean at least the multitudes of insane women who murder their own children have the common sense to know they are poisoning them!

“Hey, guys. Dinner is getting cold.”

“Coming, Mom,” I answered.

“You know Henry has already started to eat his dinner.”

Ironically, Henry could have been the main course of an extraterrestrial meal. That would not have ever been prevented by dinner roll Mom and martini and TV Dad.

“Okay, that’s it. You both come to dinner right now.”

My father grabbed Herbert before we even had a chance to make it downstairs. He pulled him and dragged him into the dining room in a completely embarrassing drunken stupor.

“Come on boy, you love the bay,” he said after dinner.

“Fine, I’ll go, Dad I followed behind very closely to keep an eye on my brother the vampire and my father the drunk. They walked a little while and we all felt the wonderful cool sea breeze. That was one of the great pleasures of living so close to the bay.

“It’s a great night, son.”

“Yes, it is,” answered Herbert.

“Don’t see any mosquitoes out here.”

“No.”

“Who is that?” asked Dad.

“I think it’s your friend. That fisherman Benjamin Shaw is waving his hands.”

We could all see Ben’s fishing boat. It was sinking and Ben was waving his hands up and down frantically.

“He must be having a party.”

“No, Dad, I don’t think so.”

“Why?”

“His boat is sinking.”

The minute we realized this, we saw his partner jump out of the boat and swim. We could see the great fin follow closely. The man tried to swim away but to no avail. Shaw was either being cowardly or fatalistic in the next choice he made. He jumped out of his boat and swam towards the docks where we were all standing.