May Bird and the Ever After

  “Well, just imagine you could do anything you wanted to do. What would it be?”

  Pumpkin stuck a finger in his mouth, thinking. “Have you ever heard of William Shakespeare?”

  May nodded eagerly. “Sure.”

  “Well, he runs a song and dance revue, out in the Nothing Platte—it’s very famous.”

  “Really?”

  “I want to work there. As a singer.”

  “Wow, really?” May knew she must have looked shocked, because Pumpkin turned crimson.

  “I . . . I’m sorry, I just had no idea you could sing. And you seem kind of . . . timid.”

  “I don’t feel timid when I sing.”

  May smiled. She knew what he meant. She wasn’t timid when she was running through the forest being an Amazon. “Can I hear some?”

  “What? Oh, nooo . . .”

  “Oh, please? Let me hear you sing.”

  Pumpkin was shaking his head, but in that way that people do when they really want you to talk them into something.

  “Please!” May was practically hopping up and down. “Just not too loud, okay?” she added, peering over her shoulder again.

  Pumpkin stopped in his tracks. “Okay.” He cleared his throat. “Okay,” he said again, getting up his nerve. “I like to imagine that there’s a whole bunch of specters who’ve been in horrible accidents in the audience. And they’re missing arms and legs and things and really needing to be cheered up, right?”

  May nodded. “Okay.”

  “I get up on stage, make a few jokes, and then . . .” He thrust a hand out into the air and opened his mouth.

  “Iiiii ain’t got nobodddddy. . . .”

  May stood watching in shock. Pumpkin had the clearest, most fantastic voice she had ever heard.

  Pumpkin was wiggling his hips and looking like a different ghost—poised and confident.

  “Won’t some sweet mama come and take a chance with me, ’cause I ain’t so bad.”

  At the last word he shut his lips abruptly, blinked a few times, then blushed. May burst into applause.

  “You were born to be in that Shakespeare revue,” she gushed in wonder.

  “Nah. I’m a house spirit. That’s all I’ll ever be.”

  “That’s crazy,” May said. “You’re selling yourself short.”

  Pumpkin giggled modestly. “Oh, go on.”

  After that, a warm glow seemed to have been cast on the walk. Pumpkin moved with a spring in his hover, and May with a spring in her step.

  Two more days went by, with nothing but endless beach. On the third day May and Pumpkin began to make out something up ahead. It took another ten minutes to figure out that it was a figure. It moved back and forth along the beach, to the edge of the water and back toward the cliffs.

  “Uh-oh,” Pumpkin said.

  “What is that?” May asked.

  The way the figure moved made May cross her arms tightly with worry. It didn’t float like the other spirits she’d seen—drifty and slow. It jerked and leaped like a flame.

  “I don’t know.”

  May looked at Pumpkin, whose face was drawn.

  “Who would be out here on this beach?”

  He shook his head.

  “We should probably walk closer to the cliffs.” They had drifted on a soft angle away from them, and now they drifted back, slowing as they continued down the beach. For a while they lost sight of the figure behind a rocky outcropping, and when they saw it again they were much nearer to it than they’d expected.

  “Ohhh,” Pumpkin said in a low voice, clinging to May’s arm with a zap, but a small zap. “Oooh, get down.” He pulled her to the sand, holding her in a zappy death grip.

  The creature up ahead was horribly ugly. He was red and slimy with black, droopy lips and a long, black spear in one hand. His arms hung at his sides and flopped as he moved. He was far enough away that he couldn’t see them unless he looked hard, but close enough that May could see the glinting sharpness of his long, black teeth, curling out of his mouth.

  “W-What is it?” she whispered, eyes agape. Pumpkin’s body trembling against hers made her own teeth chatter.

  “Ghoul.”

  Ma slammed her mouth—and her chattering teeth—shut.

  The creature loped around the beach in circles, looking up at the stars, then out at the water.

  “Ohhh. Very little light from the stars tonight,” Pumpkin whispered, his voice shaky.

  “What does that have to do with anything?” May hissed, thinking they had more to worry about than the weather.

  “It’s better for them. Ghouls love the dark.”

  “Oh.” May shrunk closer to Pumpkin.

  While they watched, the creature thrust a thumb in his nose and began to pick it, pulling his finger out and examining it.

  “Uck,” May whispered.

  “We should turn around,” Pumpkin whispered.

  May had to admit, the thought had just crossed her mind. “You can if you want.”

  Pumpkin shook his head.

  “I don’t want to leave you. W-We should maybe take one of the caves,” he said, pointing to an opening in the rock just ahead. “We can try to go around him.”

  May followed his eyes. The caves, each one of them that she’d looked into, gaped with pitch-black darkness. “Um, I think we’d better just wait here until he goes away,” May said. She didn’t want to tell Pumpkin what the Undertaker had said about the caves and turn him into a blubbering mess. What if they had to go in? “If he comes this way, we’ll just duck into the tunnel until he’s gone.”

  “But I don’t want to lose my guts,” Pumpkin said, moaning.

  May stared at him, then at the caves again, indecisive. Finally she said, “I promise I won’t let you lose your guts.”

  They settled down in the sand to wait, both sitting cross-legged with their backs against the rock of the cliffs.

  The ghoul continued to do his weird little dance around the sand. May and Pumpkin agreed to take turns keeping watch to see if he left or came in their direction. But May, whose turn it was to rest first, had a hard time falling asleep, knowing the ghoul was so close. She kept wondering what it would feel like to have her guts eaten.

  Pumpkin woke her some time in the middle of the night, and conked out as soon as she’d taken over watch, snoring loudly. She tried to hold his nose to make him stop, which turned her fingers to ice. She didn’t know if the ghoul might have extra-sensitive hearing.

  She was just in the middle of trying to roll Pumpkin onto his side when the ghoul seemed to change his routine. He now stood at the very edge of the sea, peering out into the water.

  May sank back, alert, and strained her eyes toward the water, but there was only darkness. And then a shadow began to pull away from the black mass of the sea. And then another, and another.

  “Boats,” May whispered.

  A group of three long rowboats was inching slowly across the water toward the shore. The ghoul on the sand seemed to get more excited the closer they got. He snarled and jumped up and down.

  Shadows moved within the boats. May shook Pumpkin by the shoulders. “Pumpkin, wake up,” May squeaked.

  As the tips of the boats reached shore, the shadows began to scurry out, revealing themselves to be ghouls just like the first. One after the other, they scrabbled out of the boats onto the sand, until there were at least a hundred of them snarling and jabbering at one another. “Bblgggllllbbl.”

  “Hogubbleebluggghhhh.”

  May and Pumpkin cowered in their spot, staying extra still.

  “What do you think they’re talking about?”

  “It can’t be anything good,” Pumpkin said, pulling his knees up in front of his face so that only his eyes showed, and his voice came out muffled. “They aren’t supposed to be up here. Oh no, not good at all.”

  “You think they’re up to something?” May asked.

  Pumpkin hugged his knees tight. “I just hope they go away.”

  B
ut the ghouls didn’t show any sign of going away. In fact, over the next few hours they built a huge fire and pulled out cases of bottles from the bottoms of their boats, throwing them open and passing the bottles around to drink from. They began to get wilder and wilder, snarling louder, dancing around the leaping blue fires they’d built.

  Some of the ghouls stumbled to the outside of the circle and passed out.

  May noticed one in particular, sneaking toward the crate of drinks and hoisting it up, then scurrying a little farther down the beach. Another ghoul noticed the first, and as the thief sank down on the sand with his stolen goods, the other let out an ear-piercing shriek. Suddenly all the creatures dropped what they were doing and rushed down the beach, surrounding the thief. From the center of it all came a loud scream. And then all went quiet, and the ghouls straggled back to their fire. The thief had disappeared.

  “What happened?” May whispered. “Where’d he go?”

  Pumpkin whimpered. “Maybe they ate him.”

  They looked at each other and moved a little closer together.

  That night they moved back to the very mouth of the cave behind them, and Pumpkin kept watch while May’s eyelids drooped until she was asleep. In the morning the ghouls were all still there. They had laid out towels all over the beach and lounged on their stomachs and backs, some reading books, some sipping on drinks.

  “They’re star bathing,” Pumpkin explained. “I’ve heard ghouls are very into their complexions. Goblins too.”

  May and Pumpkin stayed in their spot at the side of the cliff, May drawing holes in the sand with her fingers. All day the ghouls stayed put. And that night around midnight, another host of boats arrived.

  “It’s like they’re getting ready for something,” Pumpkin said.

  That night the ghouls erupted into the same loud revelry that they had the night before. It seemed to May that Pumpkin was right. And that it was more and more dangerous to stay.

  Around dawn the next day, May awoke to a scratching sound, and something hit her on the forehead. “Ouch.” She sat up, staring upward. There was Pumpkin holding onto a tiny ledge of the cliff, reaching above himself.

  “Got it,” he said, breaking a shiny piece of rock off the wall. He landed, grinning at May and holding up the rock. “Silverstone,” he said proudly. As he did, there was a loud crumbling noise above, and they both looked up.

  “Ah!” May lunged for Pumpkin and pushed him out of the way, just as a pile of rocks slid down from above and landed in the spot where they’d been standing.

  “Uh-oh.” Pumpkin said. They both turned to look in the direction of the ghouls. Several were standing up, peering in their direction. And then a few started to walk toward them, sniffing the air.

  “Pumpkin!” May whispered. Pumpkin looked at her very sadly.

  “Sorry.”

  She looked into the mouth of the cave, then back to the beach. The ghouls were on their way.

  Somber Kitty curled up in a tiny nook in the rock and peered out at the strange landscape of the southwest Ever After. He had never lost his bearings before, but he had lost them now, and it was very distressing. Confusion and embarrassment were quickly turning his accustomed melancholy into true sorrow and misery. He was even too sad to meow.

  For seven days Somber Kitty had wandered along the banks of the Styx Streamway with only a lady’s pointed finger to guide him. He hadn’t encountered another soul, living or dead. And though the smell of danger had drifted far behind him, the uncertainty was almost as bad—not to mention the hunger. He hadn’t eaten in a week.

  Truth be told, Somber Kitty was losing hope.

  Curled in his spot in the cave, he was just drifting off into another hunger-induced sleep, when he saw something drifting toward him across the landscape. It reminded him of the sun, or at the very least, a lightbulb. If he had known more astronomy, it would have reminded him of a comet.

  Somber Kitty was too mesmerized to hide.

  The light entered the cave and drifted down beside him. It laid what felt like warm hands on him and stroked his back, scratched behind his ears and his favorite spot under his chin. The warm touch felt like love itself. And Somber Kitty knew something about love.

  The petting only lasted a moment. The light gave him one final squeeze and drifted away.

  Somber Kitty stood on his tired legs and pressed on.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Into the Catacombs

  May pulled her starlight out of her pocket and held it up to illuminate the walls of the tunnel they had entered.

  “Ahh!” Pumpkin cried, and leaped as the walls of the Catacombs came into focus. They were lined with thousands of eyes, staring at them. May stumbled back a few feet, the light glinting along the walls. And then . . .

  “Pumpkin?”

  He had already run halfway back toward the opening of the cave.

  “It’s just skulls. Look.”

  May made a wide arc with her hand, showing that the thousands of eyes belonged to skulls that lined the walls like bricks.

  “Whoa,” May breathed. Pumpkin started to inch back toward her.

  They were in a tunnel that led into shadows up ahead, the ceiling just barely arching above Pumpkin’s hair, so that he stooped slightly.

  “These tunnels are very ancient,” Pumpkin pointed out. “Some of these skulls are thousands of years old.”

  May was impressed. Maybe she had underestimated Pumpkin. “How can you tell?”

  “Look.”

  He pointed to a skull down at the level of his thigh. Somebody had carved into it with a tiny, sharp instrument: NEBUCHADNEZZAR WAS HERE. APRIL 4, 103.

  Pumpkin started skipping along ahead. “Pumpkin, be careful.” He looked perplexed.

  “You should let me lead. I have the starlight.”

  They trudged forward, May lighting the way with her light, following the winding of the tunnel. A few minutes later they reached a spot where it forked off into two branches. She pulled out her compass. “Nine Knaves Grotto is between here and the city. So if we’re headed toward the city, we’re headed toward the grotto.” May held up the compass toward the tunnel on the left. The needle tipped very definitely to Wrong Way.

  “What about this one?” she asked, holding it up in the direction of the other tunnel. The needle tipped to Scenic Way.

  “Well.” May sighed. She remembered her mom’s scenic routes, when they’d drive out into the counties that neighbored Briery Swamp to look for antiques, staying off the highways. What I wouldn’t give for one of those boring trips now, she thought. Somber Kitty had always tried to sneak into the car in some way—jumping into Mrs. Bird’s huge purse or leaping onto the roof of the car. Why hadn’t May just let him come?

  She choked back the lump in her throat. May didn’t really want the scenic route now, but that seemed to be the only choice.

  For hours they followed the twists and turns of the caves, May listening for the sound of anything that might be sharing the Catacombs with them. It was much cooler in here, and May shivered. “It’s weird being in here without the sky for so long,” she said to Pumpkin, who drifted along tentatively a few feet behind her. Every time she waited for him to catch up and walk beside her, he fell back, pretending his shoe was untied or acting like he’d seen something interesting on the ground, until May was again safely in the lead.

  May had been hoping the caves would lead them back out into the open before it was time to sleep. She worried that her compass might be wrong, and that they would end up going farther and farther into the heart of the cliffs and never come out again.

  The route they were taking did seem to run parallel to the Dead Sea, though there was no telling for sure. Finally they were too tired to go any farther without at least a little sleep. She and Pumpkin lay right down in the middle of the tunnel. There was nowhere else to go. “I hope we get out of here tomorrow,” she said.

  “Me too. This place gives me the creeps.”

  In the gl
ow of May’s starlight, Pumpkin and May looked at each other.

  “I’m glad I’m not alone in here.”

  Pumpkin nodded. “Me too.”

  May crossed her arms, squeezing her elbows. “I wish I had a blanket.”

  She tried to snuggle closer to Pumpkin, but his body was colder than the tunnel was. At least the zapping had faded. May guessed she had gotten used to it.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Ghosts are just cold.”

  “That’s okay.”

  May snuggled close to him anyway.

  “Pumpkin?”

  “Mmhmm?”

  “Thanks for coming with me.”

  She smiled at him, and he smiled a jagged smile back. It looked more like a grimace. Then she blew out her starlight.

  “May?”

  May was shaken awake by the shoulders. When she opened her eyes, she saw Pumpkin leaning over her, frowning. He held the starlight in one hand.

  “What is it?”

  “Look.”

  Pumpkin pointed to a spot beside May’s hip.

  By the dim glow of the light she saw a big black lump in the sand right beside her. May scrambled back a few paces, walking like a crab.

  “That wasn’t there last night,” she said nervously, suddenly wide awake.

  Pumpkin nodded.

  She snapped her head up and down the tunnel, as if she might see who had left it there. But the tunnel was black beyond a few feet.

  “What is it?”

  Pumpkin kept silent, inserting one finger into his mouth.

  “How do you think it got here?” Again, nothing . . . except the rattle of Pumpkins teeth. They knelt on the sand, staring at it, as if it might leap up and bite them.

  May reached toward the object slowly. But nothing. Her fingers landed on it gently. It was made of fabric, the softest, silkiest fabric May had ever touched.

  “I think . . .” May lifted it gently, then began to unfold it. “Pumpkin, it’s a blanket.”

  They both gave each other a meaningful look, their eyes wide. Then May peered up and down the tunnel. “Do you think someone heard us?” she whispered. “Last night?”