When the phone went dead, my first thought was that I had gone out of range.
Then I heard a crackle—not from the phone, but from the darkness around me.
Even worse, the closet suddenly smelled wrong. The familiar odor of dirty socks was gone, replaced by something damp, wild, and disturbing.
Scary as that was, I didn’t actually scream until a deep, raspy voice said, “Ah, good—we have made contact!”
Then I let out a shriek that made the baby howl too.
I groped frantically for the doorknob, found it, discovered it would not turn.
“Do not be afraid,” said the voice, which seemed to come from a great distance. “We will not hurt you. We can’t even reach you yet.”
Part of me thought, Well, that’s a relief.
Another part thought, Yet?!?
And still another part thought, WE???
“Who are you?” I cried. “What do you want?”
“My name is unimportant. What I want is for you to promise to take care of the baby.”
“I’m doing that already!”
“Good, I am glad to know that. Guard him well. But remember, he is not yours! I will be back next month.”
“What?”
But the voice was gone. Suddenly the doorknob, which I was still clutching, turned in my hand. The door swung open and I bounded out of the closet. My stomach clenched as I realized I hadn’t touched the door three times before I opened it! I started back inside so I could fix that mistake, then decided that was insane. A pain in the gut from skipping the ritual was better than getting back in that closet! I was already shaking so violently, you could have used me to mix paint.
A pudgy hand patted my face. I looked down and realized LD was now totally human. He rested his head on my shoulder. For some reason that calmed me a little. Patting his back, crooning wordlessly, I carried him to his room. The moon was still shining through the window, so I put him in the rocker, then pulled the crib out of the light. For good measure, I drew the curtains, too.
As I did all this, I was struck with a new thought: I should have waited until Mom got home to turn LD back! She’s never going to believe me if I tell her what just happened.
Of course, when Lily had been giving me advice, I wasn’t thinking about what came next. I just wanted to get the baby back into his normal form. My thoughts shifted. What about that voice? Where had it come from?
I was at the kitchen table, trying to work this through, when the front door opened and Mom called, “How did it go, sweetie?”
“Fine,” I replied, tugging my earlobe and cursing myself for fibbing. But what could I tell her? That the baby had turned into a monster? She’d think I had lost my mind. Suddenly I wondered if I could make it happen again. But how? I couldn’t just say, “Let’s put the baby in the moonlight so you can see what happens.”
“The baby slept all right?” asked Mom, coming into the kitchen.
Time to get creative. Trying to call up some of my grandfather’s ability to spin a yarn, I said, “Well, he did stir a little when the moon rose. I went in to check on him. Gosh, you should have seen him, Mom. He was so cute in the moonlight!”
She looked at me oddly.
“Come on,” I said eagerly. “I’ll show you.”
“I don’t want to wake him,” she said.
Luck was with me, because we heard a squawk from upstairs.
“He knows you’re home,” I said. “He probably wants to see you!”
Mom looked at me oddly again but followed me up the stairs.
“You moved the crib,” she said, as soon as we entered the room.
“I thought the light was disturbing him. But since he’s awake—”
Before she could say anything, I pushed the crib back where it had been and threw open the curtains. Instantly LD was bathed in silver moonlight.
“See how cute?” I said, looking for any sign of a change.
Nothing happened.
LD stretched out his arms to be picked up.
Mom reached for him.
Desperate, I said, “Let’s just admire him for a second, Mom! See how the moonlight makes his eyes sparkle?”
“Jacob, are you sure you’re all right?”
“Of course!” I lied. Inside I was crushed. It wasn’t going to happen.
I didn’t sleep well that night, not well at all.
Things didn’t look any better the next morning when I got to the cemetery. Lily was waiting for me, and the expression on her face was almost as frightening as a rough voice in a dark closet.