CHAPTER TWELVE

 

Holden yanked open the blinds in his bedroom, staring up at the full moon. It was low in the sky, just crowning over the horizon, but he thought it might be the most beautiful thing that he’d ever seen.

He wondered why he’d never spent much time looking at the moon before. It had always been there, his whole life, every night, hanging in the night sky. It was so pretty, the way it changed shape, dwindling down to a sliver and then growing fatter and fatter as the month wore on. It was set in a sky of glittering stars, but it glittered biggest and brightest of all the things in the night sky. He was enamored with the moon.

He wished he could somehow get closer to it.

“Holden?” said Melanie.

“Hmm?” He didn’t turn away from his window. He could hear his sister just find without looking at her.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” he said, staring lovingly at the moon.

“Because it looks to me like you’re looking at the moon.”

“So?”

Mel came further into the room. He heard her rather than saw her. “Listen, Holden, I didn’t want to say anything because I wasn’t sure, but I can’t get in touch with Mrs. Finch, and I told her what I thought, and now you’re mesmerized by the moon, and… I don’t know, I think I should call the SF.”

Holden turned around. “What are you talking about, Mel?”

“I think you’re turning into a werewolf, little brother.”

He furrowed his brow. “What?”

“The scratches on your back,” said Mel. “And that girl. No one’s seen her parents since the last full moon. And Mrs. Finch couldn’t get in touch with them. It’s like they disappeared. I think they’re dead, Holden. And I think she did something to you.”

Holden looked back at the moon, his heart stuttering. What had Coach said? You don’t want to find yourself howling at the moon, so wrap it up next time.

The moon reached for him, at least that was how it felt. Its beams of light shone down and penetrated his skin.

Something inside him moved.

He lurched back, looking down at his body.

“What?” said Mel. “Holden, what?”

He ran his hands through his hair. “I need to find Carrie.”

“No, that’s the last thing you need to do. She’s the one who did this to you.”

He shook his head. “She wouldn’t have. I don’t believe she meant to do it.”

Mel took him by the shoulders. “You are my baby brother, and I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

He shook her off. It wasn’t hard. He was a good deal stronger than she was. “Sorry, Mel.” He headed for the door.

“Holden, I’m calling the SF!” she yelled.

He didn’t stop, though. He left the apartment and ran for his car.

* * *

Holden pulled up in the driveway of Carrie’s house and got out of the car.

The wind had picked up, and it was tossing the tree branches, making them rattle like old bones. The wind cut into his skin, taking his breath away. He struggled to walk across the driveway to the door of the house.

And when he looked up at the moon, its light stabbed him deep in his chest, making something in his body writhe.

Terror splintered in him.

There was something in his body—something foreign and strange. And he wasn’t in control of it.

He banged on the door of the house.

But the noise from the wind was so loud, he wasn’t sure if anyone heard him, so he tried the door knob. The door opened.

He stepped over the threshold. The house was dark inside. A faint light filtered out from the kitchen, but it only cast a ghastly glow over the hallway, barely illuminating the features of the place. The house was old and stately. From here, Holden could see the outline of the chandelier hanging in the foyer, the ornate carved crown molding against the ceiling, the framed paintings on the walls. Right now, the house was giving Holden the creeps.

Goosebumps popped out all over his skin.

The door slammed behind him.

Holden jumped, letting out a little cry.

But then he realized it was the wind outside. The wind had blown the door shut.

And then a wave of pain seized his body. He grunted. Then stumbled forward, grabbing onto the railing of the stairwell for balance. “Carrie!” he called up the steps.

But there was no response, only the sound of the wind howling around the house outside.

If that howling was the wind. Maybe it was wolves.

“Carrie!” he shrieked.

His body convulsed. The thing inside him was moving and growing, trying to get out. Oh God, it wanted out. He couldn’t let this thing inside him out. He needed to stop it. But he had no idea how.

He gripped the railing and hurried up the steps.

Upstairs, it was dark as well. He pushed open the door to Carrie’s room. He could see her bed, the covers askew. Her closet door open, clothes spilling out of it. But no one was in there.

Across the hall, there was another room, its door standing wide open. It had a bed in it as well, but that one was made. There was a bag sitting on top of it, half open. He could see folded clothes inside. There was nothing else in the room.

“Carrie!” he yelled.

No answer.

Pain went through him again—like his whole body was ripping apart. He screamed, colliding with the wall, twitching against the pain there, like a bug pinned to a card.

Eventually, the wave passed.

He opened his eyes and found himself staring into the room where he’d made love to Carrie. It looked just the same. The wide, wide bed, the walk-in closet, the tasteful framed pictures on the wall.

He thought of what it had been like, lying there with Carrie, deep inside her, her body twined around his. The way it had felt—like liquid bliss.

And then more pain.

It felt like something was digging its claws into his brain. He gasped, slapping at the back of his head, trying to shake it off. But there was nothing there. Whatever it was was inside of him.

He let out a strangled cry. “What did you do to me, Carrie?”

No answer.

Holden threw open the rest of the doors upstairs, looking in the bathroom with its white, peaceful tile and its clawfoot bathtub. He even looked in the closet, but he only found stacks of fluffy towels.

There was no one upstairs.

He ran back downstairs. At the bottom of the steps, another wave of misery cut into him. It made him go tense and stiff, and he lost his balance, tumbling down the rest of the stairs to land face first at the landing.

When he tried to get up, he could only make it to his hands and knees before another wave hit him.

His spine was stretching.

His bones were moving.

He screamed.

But something in him drove him forward, and he dragged himself down the hallway. He headed for the kitchen, for that one ghostly light.

The pain was all over now. Everything hurt, even his fingernails. His whole body was changing shape, snapping into a new place, but he struggled to keep crawling, keep moving. He grunted and yelled.

“Carrie!” he called out one more time.

Only silence.

And it was getting harder to think, to focus. The pain was overtaking everything, blinding his mind and wiping him out. He was being erased.

The thing inside was coming.

And there was nothing he could do about it.