And stared in bitter horror at the velvet-lined walls of a coffin.
She was inside the coffin. Six feet under the ground. Trapped inside. Hunkered low against the closed lid.
Inside the rotting corpse of Sarah Fear.
Yes. Sarah Fear was dead. Drowned in Fear Lake. And up above, poking up through the loamy cemetery ground, stood Sarah’s gravestone.
Surrounded by four other stones. Stones for Michael, for Margaret, for their father, and for Jason Hardy. All dead. All drowned in the boiling waters of the lake.
And now the evil spirit shared Sarah’s grave. Imprisoned beside the foul, decaying body it once possessed.
Defeated by Sarah’s courage. Trapped by Sarah’s final sacrifice.
It waited.
Waited eagerly for a live body to come along and free it.
Waited. Waited.
Staring at the worms that invaded Sarah’s grinning skull.
* * *
Corky woke.
She sat up, alert, wide awake. Trembling. Her sheets were tangled, hot, and damp from perspiration.
She could still see Sarah Fear’s corpse, the decaying walls of the small coffin. She could still hear the roar of the churning lake in her mind, still hear the hiss of the escaping green gas, still hear the hideous howl of the evil spirit dying.
Corky swallowed hard. She realized she was crying. Hot tears rolled down her even hotter cheeks. Sarah Fear has told me all I need to know, she thought, letting the tears fall.
To kill the evil, I have to kill…myself.
Hot Water
Chapter 20
Kimmy Must Die
Corky drifted back into a troubled sleep. When she awoke again, sunlight was streaming in through her bedroom windows, the curtains fluttering in a soft breeze.
She sat up, stretching, and stared down at the foot of her bed into the bulging eyes of a hideous orange-fleshed face covered with stitched-up scars.
Corky opened her mouth to scream. But then recognized the intruder as Sean’s rubber mask from Halloween.
Sean must have placed it on the bedpost while she slept.
“Way to go, Sean,” she said out loud, shaking her head. Reaching over, she pulled the disgusting mask off its perch and tossed it into the corner.
My little brother is a real monster, she thought.
As she lowered her feet to the floor and stretched again, the images of her dream, the images from Sarah Fear’s memory, came back, forced themselves vividly into her mind, as vividly as if she had lived them herself.
But how can I kill myself? she asked herself, staring at the rubber mask she had tossed to the floor.
Never see Sean again? Never see my parents again? Never go out? Never fall in love? Never get married? Have a family? Have a life?
I’m only sixteen, Corky thought miserably. Sixteen. Too young to die.
“No!” she declared aloud. “No way!”
She thought of Bobbi. Poor Bobbi—she never lived long enough to…to do anything!
I owe it to Bobbi, Corky thought, standing up unsteadily, her mind racing. I owe it to my poor dead sister to go on living. To have a full life—a full, happy life.
But how?
She could sense the evil stirring inside her. Waking, it started to dull her thoughts and she began to fade into the background.
She began to drift away—inside her own body.
I’m going to ignore it, Corky decided.
That’s how I’ll deal with it. I’ll ignore it, and it’ll go away.
If it tries to do something terrible, I can deal with it. I know I can. I just won’t cooperate.
If I ignore it. Or if I fight it. I mean, I’ll ignore it. And then…
She knew she wasn’t thinking clearly. But how could she? Her room was so far away…the windows so tiny and distant…the light so dim.
“No!” she cried, struggling to resist the force taking over her mind. “No! I’m ignoring you!”
She heard cruel laughter. Then her bedroom walls began to quake.
“No!”
The flowers—the red carnations, the blue gardenias—all the flowers on the wallpaper started to spin.
“No!”
The flowers spun wildly, then flew off the wallpaper, spinning up to the ceiling.
“No! Please—no!”
Corky heard the laughter again, loud laughter inside her head as the red and blue flowers rained down on her. Another peal of cruel laughter.
Turning away from the wall, Corky quickly pulled on a pair of gray sweat pants and a wrinkled blue T-shirt. Then, she ran out onto the landing and started down the stairs. But as she stepped onto the first one, a row of razor blades popped up from the carpet.
“Ow!” She cried out as her bare foot nearly missed getting sliced.
Leaning on the banister, she stared down as razor blades popped up with a loud snap on each step.
She flung herself onto the banister and slid down on her stomach. The banister was burning hot by the time she leapt off at the bottom.
“Corky—what on earth?!” her mother exclaimed. She was standing in the hallway, a bundle of dirty clothes in her arms.
“Oh. Sorry, Mom,” Corky said, swallowing hard. She looked up at the stairs. The razor blades were gone.
“You slept so late,” Mrs. Corcoran said, dropping the clothing by the basement steps. “It’s almost noon.”
Corky opened her mouth to speak. But what could she say? No words came out. She followed her mother into the kitchen.
“I’m going to fry up a couple of eggs for you,” Corky’s mom said, gazing fretfully at her daughter. “You look hungry.”
“Yes,” Corky said weakly. She hoped her mother didn’t see how hard she was breathing, how her entire body was trembling. Trying to steady herself, to appear calm, Corky climbed onto a stool at the kitchen counter and watched as Mrs. Corcoran made two eggs.
“Toast? Juice?” her mother asked.
“I guess,” Corky replied, struggling to keep her voice low and steady, struggling against the wild, swirling thoughts in her head.
Her mother stared at her, as if examining her. “You feeling okay, Corky?”
“No, Mom. I’m inhabited by an evil spirit. It’s inside me, controlling me, and I can’t do anything about it.”
“Very funny,” Mrs. Corcoran said sarcastically, rolling her eyes. She tapped her metal spatula beside the frying pan. “Do all teenagers develop such gross senses of humor, or is it just a specialty of yours?”
I’m telling the truth, Mom! But you don’t want to hear it, do you? You don’t want to believe it.
“Where is Sean?” Corky asked. The words weren’t hers. The evil spirit was forcing her to change the subject.
“He and your dad are at his baseball game,” Mrs. Corcoran replied. She scraped the eggs from the pan. “You haven’t spent much time with your brother lately.”
“He left me a little reminder of himself this morning,” Corky said, picturing the gruesome rubber mask.
Her mother deposited the two fried eggs on a plate and set it down in front of Corky. “Get your toast when it’s ready,” she said, and disappeared to deal with the laundry.
Corky stared down at the eggs, then reluctantly picked up her fork.
As she gazed at the plate, the eggs shimmered, then transformed themselves. Corky’s mouth dropped open as she now stared at two enormous wet eyeballs.
“No!”
The eyeballs stared back at her. Their color darkened to gray. Then the gray became a sickening green, the green of decay, and a foul odor rose up from the plate. As the putrid aroma filled the air and the eyeballs shriveled and wrinkled, Corky gagged and leapt off the stool.
The laughter, the cruel, cold laughter, followed her as she ran blindly back up to her room.
I give up, she thought, flinging herself facedown on her bed. She started to sob, but her breath caught in her throat. A wave of nausea swept over her as she felt the evil force move withi
n her.
The phone rang. It took her a while to recognize the sound. It rang again. Again.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Corky? It’s me.” Kimmy.
“Hi, Kimmy. How’s it going?” She tried to sound casual, but her voice broke.
“Okay. I was just worried about you,” Kimmy replied. “I haven’t seen you since—since camp. And you were so sick and everything. I mean, it was just such a disaster. Are you better? I mean, are you okay?”
Why is Kimmy calling? Corky asked herself bitterly. She isn’t my friend, she thought, her features tightening in an unpleasant expression of hatred. Kimmy has never been my friend. She tried to kill me once. Tried to drown me.
“I saw Hannah yesterday, and she said she hadn’t seen you either,” Kimmy continued brightly. “So Hannah and I were just wondering—”
Don’t worry, Corky thought coldly. I’ll be seeing Hannah soon. Very soon. And when I see her, Hannah won’t be happy to see me.
“I’m feeling better,” Corky told Kimmy.
“Oh, good!” Kimmy exclaimed. “I really was worried about you. I mean, after all that went down. You know.”
Yes, I do know, Corky thought angrily. I do know what you’re talking about, Kimmy.
And I do know that you know too much.
You have to die, Corky decided. You have to die now, Kimmy.
“Hey, Kimmy, are you doing anything this afternoon?” Corky asked, winding the phone cord around her wrist.
“No, not really,” Kimmy replied. “Why? You want to hang out or something?”
“Yeah,” Corky answered quickly. “I really want to talk to you.”
“Great!” Kimmy exclaimed. “I want to talk to you too.”
“Can you meet me up on River Ridge in about half an hour?” Corky asked. River Ridge was a high cliff overlooking the Conononka River.
“River Ridge?” Kimmy sounded surprised. “Sure, I guess. See you in half an hour.”
Corky untwisted the cord from her arm and replaced the receiver.
Kimmy must die in water, she decided, picturing the high cliff and the river flowing beneath it.
Kimmy must die the way Sarah Fear died.
The way my sister Bobbi died.
Now.
Chapter 21
Kimmy Dies
Dark storm clouds filtered out the sun, casting a wash of eerie yellow over the afternoon sky. The air was heavy and wet…and very still. There was no wind.
Corky left her car at the end of the road and walked across the hard ground to the cliff edge. Behind her, the silent woods darkened as the black clouds hovered lower.
There was no one else around.
Standing on the rocky ledge that jutted out over the steep drop, Corky stared down at the wide brown river below. The Conononka, she saw, was high on its banks, flowing rapidly, a steady rush of sound rising up the cliff.
Ever since moving to Shadyside, Corky had enjoyed coming up to River Ridge. It was the highest spot around. Beyond the river she could see the town stretched out like some kind of model or miniature. To the north, the woods formed a winding, dark ribbon on the horizon.
It’s so peaceful up here, Corky thought. Even though she could still see Shadyside, she felt far away from it. As if she were floating over the town in a tranquil world of her own.
Corky took a step back and glanced at her watch. Where was Kimmy?
Let’s get this show on the road, she thought impatiently. She gazed up at the darkening sky, the black clouds so low now over her head. It’s so humid, she thought. The air is so still and sticky.
She realized she was perspiring, her T-shirt clinging to her back. The back of her neck started to itch.
Come on, Kimmy. Don’t you want to see the surprise I have for you?
I’m going to give Kimmy a flying lesson, she thought, her lips forming a cruel smile.
A flying lesson. And then a drowning lesson.
Hearing a car door slam behind her, Corky turned. Kimmy, dressed in a cropped red shirt over blue Lycra bike shorts, walked quickly toward her. Kimmy’s car was parked next to hers at the end of the road.
“Think it’s okay to park here?” Kimmy called.
“Sure,” Corky answered. “There’s no one else around.” And you won’t need it to leave, Corky added to herself.
Kimmy’s round cheeks were bright pink; her crimped black hair was damp and disheveled. “I thought it would be cooler up here,” she complained, brushing a strand of hair from over her eyes.
You’ll be cooler in a moment, Corky thought. “There’s no wind at all today,” Corky said. “Look at the trees.”
They both turned to gaze back at the woods. “Not a leaf moving,” Kimmy said, and focused on Corky, a questioning expression on her face. “What are we doing up here?”
Corky chuckled. “I don’t know. I thought it’d be a nice place to talk. You know.”
Kimmy glanced up at the rain-heavy clouds. “We’re going to get drenched.”
“That would feel good,” Corky said, and took a step toward the cliff’s edge. Kimmy followed her.
“You’re feeling better?” Kimmy asked with genuine concern.
Corky nodded. “Yeah. A lot.” And I’m going to feel even better in a few seconds, Corky thought to herself.
“That was so terrible at camp,” Kimmy said. “I mean, you getting sick like that. What a disaster.”
“Yeah…what a disaster,” Corky repeated with a grim smile.
“And all that stupid stuff with Hannah,” Kimmy added, avoiding Corky’s eyes. “You know I didn’t do any of that stuff to her. You believe me, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” Corky replied. “I didn’t do it either.”
“So…what do you think?” Kimmy asked, turning to face Corky, searching her face. “I mean, what do you think happened?”
“I think Hannah did those things to herself,” Corky told her, forcing herself to keep a straight face.
“The scalding bath? The braid?”
“I think she faked the scalding bath,” Corky said in a low voice. “I think she just screamed and carried on. I don’t think she was really burned—just a little red.”
“And you think she cut her own hair?” Kimmy asked.
Corky nodded solemnly.
“But why?” Kimmy asked shrilly.
“To get both of us in trouble,” Corky said. “To make us look bad. To get us kicked off the squad so she could be the star.”
“Wow!” Kimmy’s mouth dropped open in dismay. “I never thought of that. Never. It never occurred to me that Hannah…” Her voice trailed off as she thought about it.
“Well, what did you think?” Corky asked sharply. “That I did it? Did you suspect me, Kimmy?”
“No!” Kimmy protested, her cheeks reddening. “No, I didn’t, Corky. I—I didn’t know what to think. I knew the evil spirit had to be around. I knew the evil had to be responsible. But I didn’t know where. I mean, I didn’t know who. I just…”
Corky felt a drop of rain on her forehead. Enough stalling around, she thought. I’d better get this over with.
“The evil is around,” Corky said, lowering her voice to a whisper. She felt another large raindrop, this time on top of her head. Then one on her shoulder.
“Huh?” Again Kimmy’s mouth dropped open in surprise. “You mean—Hannah? Do you think it’s inside Hannah?”
“Maybe,” Corky replied mysteriously.
“It’s starting to rain,” Kimmy said, holding out her palms. “Maybe we should go back to your car and talk.”
“Okay,” Corky replied. “But first look down there.” She pointed straight down over the cliff’s edge. “I’ve been trying to figure out what that is, but I can’t.”
“What?” Kimmy leaned over and peered down at the rushing river.
Corky reached out and shoved Kimmy. Hard.
Kimmy uttered a loud shriek as she went over the side. Her arms thrashed wildly as she dropped head-first. br />
A grin spread over Corky’s face as she stood, hands on hips, and watched Kimmy plunge to her death.
Chapter 22
Triumph of Evil
“Kimmy is dead.”
Corky said the words out loud, a triumphant smile spreading across her face.
Raindrops fell gently, a few at a time. Standing on the cliff edge, Corky peered down at the brown, flowing river water.
“Kimmy is dead.”
Still smiling, Corky started to leave. But from somewhere deep inside her a muffled voice shouted: “No!”
She hesitated.
I have to leave now. Kimmy is dead. Now I have to take care of Debra.
And again the distant, muffled voice cried out: “No!”
The smile faded on Corky’s face, and her eyes narrowed unpleasantly.
“No!”
The rain fell harder. The gentle ping on the ground became a steady drumroll. I have to finish Debra now.
“No!”
The protesting voice was Corky’s. The real Corky trying to make herself heard, struggling to regain control.
“No! I can’t let this happen!” The real Corky’s voice grew stronger.
“I am in control now!” the evil force cried out. “Stay back! I’m warning you!”
“No!” Corky called out with renewed strength.
“No!” From somewhere deep in her own mind Corky lashed out, pushed her way forward, pressed against the heavy evil.
The horror of Kimmy’s death—the horror of what Corky had just done—had reached through the evil, had brought Corky to life. She knew she had no choice. She had to fight it. Now.
“Stay back!” the ancient evil warned. “Stay back where you belong!”
“No!” Corky fought back, struggling within herself, struggling blindly as the ground disappeared, along with the sky, the trees, everything.
She was nowhere. In a gray limbo. Fighting a foe she couldn’t see…fighting herself.
“I have to die!” she told herself. “I have to die now!”
And another part of her said, “No. I cannot die! I am too young. I want to live!”
“Die—and force this evil to die with you!”