“I don’t believe you,” said Mildred. “What does it even mean to negatively impact your aura?”
“You’re starting to do it right now.”
Mildred flinched.
“I don’t want to turn you and your family into burnt-out shells, but I’ll do it,” I warned her. “I’ll cook you like a hot dog.” “You’re bluffing,” said Glenn.
“You think so?” I pointed to the mess of my right ear. “Just know that this could be your face.”
“Except burnt,” said Kelley.
“Right,” I said.
“What do you want from us?” Mildred asked.
“All we want is for you to let us go,” I said.
“And your car,” Kelley added.
I nodded. “And your car.”
“Not a chance,” said Glenn.
“Really?” I asked. “Are you saying you don’t believe me? Do you think I came in here with a fake ear strapped to the side of my head that I could pop on cue?”
“It wasn’t on cue,” said Glenn. “You were obviously very surprised when it happened.”
“Right. So.. .you know it was real then.”
“I’m not doubting that your ear exploded. I’m doubting the aurora of destruction.”
“Aura.”
“What’d I say?”
“Aurora.”
“I meant aura. The first part of the call was clearly somebody blackmailing you with a voodoo doll, but it doesn’t make sense that somebody who was blackmailing you would then turn around and do you a favor. If there’d been two separate calls, I might buy it, but you’re asking us to accept a pretty big flaw in logic if you want us to believe that the blackmailer has also been nice enough to set up an aura of destruction.”
“He knows that if we die here, he’ll never get his money,” I said, thinking as quickly as you can when you suspect that part of your brain may actually be starting to leak out of your ear hole. “He didn’t do it out of kindness; it was a business requirement.” “But you said it like you were asking a favor of an administrative assistant or something,” said Glenn. “The two conversations didn’t naturally flow into each other. Again, I’m not doubting that the damage to your ear happened exactly how you claim, but I think the rest of the conversation was completely one-sided and that we are in absolutely no danger.”
“Okay,” I said. “That makes sense. I’ve always felt that when you’re at risk of your body burning from the inside out, you should err on the side of caution, but I’m not going to tell you how to live your life.”
Kelley lunged forward a bit, fingers curled into claws. “Bad aura!”
Glenn let out the most girlish scream I’d heard since that time earlier in the day when I’d let out my own girlish scream.
“I still don’t believe you, but you’ve proven your point,” he said. “We’re not giving you our car.”
“Bad aura!”
“But we’ll drive you where you need to go. It’s a minivan. We’ve got plenty of room.”
“Yeah, I saw that in the driveway,” I said. “It’s kind of like the one my aunt has.”
“We enjoy it.”
I looked at Kelley. She nodded.
“That’s fine,” I said. “Now let’s go get my friend out of your daughter’s room.”
“Are you quite sure you want to do that?” Mildred asked. “Yes.”
Mildred and Glenn glanced at each other, then shrugged. “Oooookaaaay, if that’s what you want.”
CHAPTER 20
Can you believe it? We’re more than two-thirds into this story. Unless you’re one of those weirdos who always skips ahead to the two-thirds point of a book, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for sticking with me this far.
Some of you may be reading this book for school. Not as an assigned reading project like Lord of the Flies or Animal Farm, unless you have the coolest teacher ever, but maybe for a book report. Which means that around this point, you’re probably sweating and thinking, Aw, man, did I ever pick the wrong book! There’s no literary value at all! How am I going to write a report on this thing?
Don’t worry. I’ve got your back. I’ve crammed examples of everything your teacher wants to hear about into this one chapter. Pretty sweet, huh? Stephenie Meyer wouldn’t do that for you.
The four of us (Franklin was still unconscious) walked into the hallway. As I stared at Donna’s bedroom door, I couldn’t help but think that when I opened it, I would bear witness to a horrific sight. [Foreshadowing.]
The hallway was eerily silent like a graveyard at midnight. [Simile.] [Also cliche.] It was the spookiest hallway that had ever existed in any house at any point in recorded history. [Hyperbole.] I [narrator] was a quivering bowl of jelly [metaphor] as we walked down the creepy crawly corridor [alliteration].
“This hall reminds me of The Shining,” I said. [Allusion.] [Actually, that’s probably more of a reference than an allusion. An allusion would be more subtle, like if I’d said, “I feel like I’m about to walk into Room 217.”] [It’s Room 217 in the book and Room 237 in the movie. They changed it because the hotel where it was filmed had a Room 217 but not a Room 237, and they didn’t want to use a real room number, I guess because they didn’t want guests to worry about a scary, naked old woman rising out of the bathtub.]
Our footsteps squeaked like a mouse. [Personification.] [Poor writing.]
I noticed that Kelley still had a piece of my ear on her shirt. It seemed to represent how I hadn’t listened to her. [Symbolism.] I [hero] [sort of] reached Donna’s door and thought about how you shouldn’t mess with forces you don’t understand [theme] and also about how my head and foot would feel better if only I had a cool, refreshing, raspberry ice tea Snapple [product placement]. I scratched the lightning-shaped scar on my forehead [shameless rip-off of more successful authors] [quote unquote homage], thought about what I was going to post on MySpace [outdated social media reference that fails to connect with readers] and then opened the door. It was truly a horrific sight.
This chapter is kind of short, but a couple of earlier chapters ran long, so I think it’s okay to cut this one off here.
CHAPTER 21
Adam screamed again. “Tell her to quit nibbling so hard!”
My (former) best friend without clothes was truly one of the most horrific sights I’d ever been unfortunate enough to see. I wanted to throw back my head and let out a shriek of terror that would forever reverberate through these walls.
You saw that coming, didn’t you?
You’ve been reading all this time thinking, Adam’s not in any physical danger. It’s all a big fake-out, and when Tyler opens the door, he’s going to write about it like it’s this shocking moment, but it’s only Adam naked.
I wish that were true. Unfortunately, the first two paragraphs of this chapter were a lie.
Adam lay on the bed, still wearing his jeans but no shirt. His eyes were filled with terror. And Donna had what looked like a pizza cutter, and she was rolling it up and down his chest, leaving red lines.
Black candles were everywhere, creating a creepy atmosphere and a fire hazard.
There was a dead chicken on the floor.
Also a pentagram.
And a bowl filled with, if we want to pretend that the ghastly horrors of the world don’t exist, red paint.
What are you even supposed to say when you stumble into that kind of environment? Standing there for a moment in stunned silence works, which is what we did, but what about after that? Are you supposed to say, “Hey, this is wrong,” or is that pretty much a given?