JENNIFER HID IN HER ROOM, BUT SHE KNEW THEY WERE out there. The demon things, the shadow things. She could sense them, feel them, gathering on the other side of her closed door. She could hear them whispering, plotting together. She could feel them secretly changing the house so that no one could see the change but her.

She lay on her bed, on her side, clutching her pillow over her head so she wouldn’t hear them. But she heard them anyway. Their whispers reached for her under the pillow like a skeleton’s fingers . . .

Come out, Jennifer.

Come out, come out.

Come out and see.

The whispers crept over her, crawled over her like bugs, skittering into her ears like bugs, into her brain like bugs.

Come and see.

That’s what the Winger creature had said. There were bugs in her brain, like bugs in a computer, whisper bugs sent by the devil because the devil wasn’t on the level.

Come and see, Jennifer.

Don’t try to hide.

You can’t hide from us.

The bug-whispers crawled into her brain and took hold of her like skeleton fingers and the finger-whispers pulled at her—they pulled and pulled at her mind.

Come out, Jennifer.

Come out, come out, wherever you are.

Come and see how we changed everything.

You’re the only one who can see it, Jennifer.

Come and see.

Under the pillow, Jennifer shook her head no no no. But she knew she couldn’t resist for long. She had to get up. She had to go. She had to see.

Don’t try to hide, Jennifer.

You can’t hide.

We see you.

We know where you are.

She cried out and threw the pillow aside harshly, thinking, All right already! All right! She sat up angrily on the edge of the bed. All right!

She heard the whispers of the shadow-things grow gleeful and excited. There were more of them now and they were more powerful. She didn’t want to start moving across the room but she couldn’t help it, and as she moved, the shadows whispered gleefully:

Here she comes.

She’s coming.

The bug-head.

She has bugs in her brain like bugs in a computer.

Even as she shook her head no no no, she did what they told her to do, what they made her do. She moved to the bedroom door, her eyes darting here and there as she did. She saw the Disney princesses staring at her from the calendar and the singers staring at her from their posters and her stuffed crocodile and her baby giraffe and her teddy bear—all of them staring and staring at her with their black, black eyes. They were supposed to be her friends. They had always been her friends. But they had all changed now and become stary-scary like the stary-scary-stereo. She was all alone with the shadow things. She had no friends now.

Yes, I do, she thought defiantly. Sam.

Yes. The name soothed her, like a magical charm.

Sam Hopkins.

Sam was her friend. Sam didn’t stare. He wasn’t a bear. He didn’t care when her mind made her say the strange rhymey things. Magic Sam Hopkins. He hoppity-hopkined to help her like a magic Sam-kangaroo when Jeff Winger winged down on her like a Jeff-hawk and slapped her face mean mean mean.

She was at the door now. The whispers grew stronger, louder, more insistent. Jennifer put her hands over her ears to block them out, but the whispers battered at her, threatening to break through, to crowd into her brain . . .

Trying to fight them, she thought: Sam Hopkins. Sam Hopkins. Sam Hopkins. Thinking the friend-name three times to ignite its magic power. It worked—a little. When she slowly drew her hands from her ears, the whispers had faded.

Friend, friend, friend, she thought.

But even Sam’s magic name was not strong enough to keep the whispers at bay for long. They had pulled back only to gather strength. Then they swarmed at her again, overwhelming her.

Come and see.

Come and see how we changed everything.

Now she knew there was no fighting the compulsion. The propulsion of the compulsion. She had to go. She had to see. She had to see what they had done to the house.

“Oh, Sam,” she whimpered.

Why didn’t he punch them like he punched the mean Winger boy?

But there were too many. They were too strong. Even magic Sam couldn’t help her here.

Jennifer knew what she had to do. She drew a deep breath for strength. She reached out with a trembling hand and pulled the bedroom door open wide.

At once, the whispers stopped altogether. There was silence.

And Jennifer stopped. And she stared.

“Oh!” The sound came out of her on a long breath.

It was true. They had changed everything. With their skeleton fingers. They had stripped away the yellow paisley of the hallway wallpaper, leaving only the rough, splintery, unpainted wood beneath. They had scrawled their obscene whispers on the splintery wintery walls in blood-red paint, and they had slashed and splashed and dashed their weird symbols and their hateful, violent scenes everywhere around her.

“Sam-Hopkins-Sam-Hopkins-Sam-Hopkins,” Jennifer whispered frantically very fast because she was so-scared-so-scared-so-scared.

She thought of running for Mark. Her brother. Her hero. Oh hear-oh Mark!

But no. She couldn’t get to the end of the hall where Mark was. A tree blocked the way, a tree spreading its broad branches from the hallway wall to the landing banister and beyond, spreading its branches over a flat dark lake. The flat dark lake was wide and black and deep and threatening. That blocked her way as well.

And then there was the coffin.

The coffin sat right in the middle of the hall. Right there in front of her. There was no lid on it. It was open.

Jennifer didn’t like the coffin. It scared her more than anything. She didn’t want to go near it. She didn’t want to look down into it and see what was inside.

But she had to. The whispers wouldn’t let her alone. The whispers crawled into her brain like bugs and took hold of her with their skeleton fingers, drawing her on against her own will.

“Sam Hopkins . . .”

Even the magic friend-name couldn’t make it stop. She had to go. She had to see. Step-by-step-by-step. Down the hall to where the coffin stood. Until she was standing over it, looking down. Down and down into the dark of the coffin, the dark that went down and down.

And then she saw. She didn’t want to, but she did.

The thing inside the box had once been human, but it wasn’t human now. It was dead and rotten now, a skeleton crawling with whisper bugs.

We are death, the bugs whispered out of the skeleton’s mouth.

We are angels of death.

We will destroy them.

Destroy them all.

Jennifer stared down at it, whispering back, “Sam Hopkins,” over and over as fast as she could.

But the magic friend-name wasn’t powerful enough. The demon things kept whispering out of the dead creature in the coffin:

They will see our power.

They will be afraid.

Afraid of us.

Because we are evil.

Because we are death.

Jennifer stared down at the horrible thing while the whispers rose up to her. She wanted to run away, run away, run back to her room, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t move from the spot. And then . . .

Oh, then . . . then the thing in the coffin came to life!

It sat up suddenly and reached for her.

Jennifer started screaming—screaming and screaming. She couldn’t stop. Even when the bedroom doors burst open, when her mother and brother came rushing out of their rooms . . . even as they put their arms around her, calling out to her, calling her name over and over, she couldn’t stop. She went on and on.

The whisper-things were gone. The wallpaper was back on the walls. The coffin was gone and so was the thing in the coffin.

The house was back to normal.

But Jennifer could not stop screaming.