Impatient, Aaron cleared his throat.
“Michael. My name is Aaron. I’ve followed your case for years, and I still know very little about you. I want to know more about that night. About those involved.”
His back to them, The Shape stood motionless.
And silent.
No reaction whatsoever to Sartain or to Aaron.
Growing a bit uncomfortable with the continued silence, perhaps, Aaron sought to pry a reaction out of him. “Do you think of them? Feel guilt about their fate?”
Nothing.
Aaron looked to Dana, shrugged. She stepped close to him. To lend moral support, but also in preparation for what would come next.
“Do you remember Laurie Strode?” Aaron asked. Generalities hadn’t penetrated his indifferent veneer, so maybe specifics would. One particularly specific detail.
At the mention of Laurie Strode, The Shape stretched his fingers—and then his hands became still at his side. Sartain noticed the brief movement.
“Did she remind you of your sister, Michael?” Aaron asked, seeking a breakthrough. “Is that why you chose her?”
The Shape half turned toward them. For a breathless moment, Dana thought he would respond… but then nothing. Frustrated, Aaron looked back at Sartain. The time had come, per their discussion prior to the visit. Understanding the meaning of Aaron’s inquiring gaze, Sartain nodded, giving permission for them to proceed.
Aaron took a deep breath and looked to Dana.
Of course, she knew exactly what he wanted.
She unzipped her bag.
Aaron addressed Michaeclass="underline" “I borrowed something from a friend at the Attorney General’s office. Something I’d like you to see.”
As Aaron reached inside Dana’s shoulder bag, she noticed a slight trembling of his fingers. He pulled out a portion of a white Halloween mask, a piece of Michael Myers’ history.
Sartain moved forward to observe the exchange.
Clutching it by the fake hair in back, Aaron held the full mask out before him, like bait or a lure, designed to provoke a reaction—any reaction.
The Shape stood motionless.
But the other patients in the courtyard became restless, agitated, pacing madly. Concerned, Dana looked around. It’s as if they sense something on an atavistic level inaccessible to us, she thought. Heedless, Aaron continued to hold the mask at arm’s length, like a silent accusation.
“You recognize this, don’t you, Michael?” Aaron said, his voice elevated, his tone accusing, if only to provoke a response. Though worn, creased and frayed a bit at the edges due to the passage of time, the mask would be unmistakable to him. “How does this make you feel? Say something.”
A few of the patients started screaming. The young man stuck on his red square dropped to his knees and pressed his palms to his temples, moaning. The burned man in the wheelchair wailed, digging his fingernails into the ruined side of his face as if trying to expose the bone underneath.
Most alarmingly to Dana, some of the patients tested the strength of their chains, tugging their wrists and ankles against the unforgiving metal until their limbs began to bleed with their frantic efforts. She wondered if bloodied hands would be slippery enough to slide free. And once freed, would they try to stop the cause of their agitation, the presence of the interlopers?
And yet Aaron was undeterred. He shouted, “Say SOMETHING!”
By now all the patients in the courtyard had worked themselves into an uncontrolled frenzy, a chorus of madness. All but one.
The Shape remained eerily still.
2
Already awake by the time her alarm clock buzzed, Allyson reached out and switched it off before the sound disturbed anyone else in the house. She’d always been a morning person, accused at times by close friends and family of being annoyingly chipper at dawn while they clung to their energy drinks or steaming mugs of coffee as if they were life preservers. A new day presented new opportunities, and Allyson figured, if you planned to seize the day, you might as well start with the beginning of it.
She’d picked out her workout clothes the night before, but the forecast called for a chilly morning, so she opened her closet door and flipped through the bustling row of hangers, sliding aside her tops until she came upon her gray quarter-zip running jacket with long pink-and-navy-striped sleeves, which paired well with her powder-blue running shorts. As she slipped on the jacket, she turned back to her room, her gaze falling—as if for the first time—on some of the childhood crafts and mementos she’d never tossed or boxed for attic storage. Middle-school crafts, a few stuffed animals, a Magic 8-Ball and a few items she’d probably be embarrassed to have on display if any high-school friends dropped by. At seventeen years old, she had a late-adolescent duty to move on and grow up, but somehow the transitional task of “putting away childish things” had never assumed any real urgency.
She closed the door to her closet—which surely had enough free space to hold at least a few of those childhood artifacts—made her bed and slipped out into the cool morning air. After putting her light-brown hair up in a ponytail she performed a few dynamic stretches to warm up before launching into her morning run. Even so, it took several blocks before she worked out the kinks in her stride and began to focus on her breathing and form. Once fully engaged in her run she felt as if she were meditating in motion, her breathing steady and controlled. Her movements fluid, natural, and calm, she passed a five-foot-high wrought-iron fence bordering a house now beyond the periphery of her vision. In the blink of an eye she caught a blur of motion and—
—a dog lunged at the fence, barking ferociously.
Allyson’s heart rate spiked, and she stumbled, veering from the fence, her last breath lodged in her throat. But the dog stayed on his side of the fence, no immediate threat to her, allowing her to regain her composure after several uneven strides. A few deep, calming breaths and the moment slipped behind her, but not forgotten. She chided herself for breaking one of the cardinal rules for running alone. Always be aware of your surroundings.
Her “seize the day” mentality had a relevant corollary: stay in the moment. Not always easy for someone her age. Like her friends, she tended to agonize over past missteps and then second- and triple-guess every future decision. With practically her whole life in front of her, she had as many ways to succeed as to spiral into failure due to poor choices. But that wasn’t the real worry. What if the paths to success were obscured and hard to find, while the roads to failure were broad? Or the ultimate fear—that success waited at the far end of a tightrope in a rough wind.
Slowing, she ran past a residential community garden and noticed many of the flowers and vegetables had died. Inside the garden, a woman wearing a red-and-orange saree wrapped a plant to protect it from the changing weather, the chill in the air. Breathing deeply, hands on her hips, Allyson stopped and watched the patient woman. Something in the way she handled the plant made Allyson think of a parent trying to protect her child from the random cruelties awaiting her out in the world.
While Karen, Allyson’s mother, prepared breakfast, juggling her attention between bacon in a skillet, eggs in a frying pan, and a stack of bread for the toaster, Ray proceeded with single-minded purpose in slathering peanut butter over the catch of a mouse trap. Karen wondered if Ray anticipated the mouse gorging itself before the trap sprung.
“You see this?” Ray said. “I switched from marshmallow fluff to peanut butter. We’ll see if the little devil snatches it.”
“Leave any in the jar?”