Page 21 of Are You Scared, Krowe?
"What the fuck now?" Dad grumbles when the phone begins to ring.
We don't stick around to hear whatever it is, both of us backing away until Jackson can slip in front of me, so my body can block the view of two rectangles in his pockets. His phone, and Toby's.
"Carb load, boys!" Will calls after us. "It's gonna be a big night."
Chapter 8
EveryHollowNightendsthe same way. Drunk fucking kids passed out in the cornfield, someone tied to the stake, and hell waiting to be paid.
This year's different.
The sun's just barely rising and it's cold as fuck, but I drag my ass out of bed the way I do every day... the way I have every day for the last twenty years in spite of how fucking tired I am.
Life stops for no man, so I get up and go about my day— make sure the scarecrow's up in the field, make sure the corn's growing, chase away the crows if I see 'em, and repeat to fucking infinity.
But there's something about this morning that feels different. I don't know what it is until I find myself at the edge of the field, right where it opens up to a big clearing. They call it the festival grounds, but it's not much of a place for celebration. Then again, I suppose for the fuckers that still live in the town, it's probably a reminder of some of their best times.
Hollow Night happens every year on the Saturday before Halloween. But the 'sacrifices'? Those only happen every ten years. I should know; I was the last one.
Until now, it seems.
From my angle, all I can see as I approach is the arms draped over the stake, the head down with the hat obscuring its face.
I prepare myself to have to talk down a drunk fuck who hasn't dried up from the previous night yet. I wonder who the poor sap will be.
If there's anyone who should have been safe from Hollow Night hazing, it's me. Or at least, the stereotype of a guy like me. I'm big, broad-shouldered and I can hold my liquor. And I was one of them. But that didn't stop them from leaving me out there.
I still don't remember how I got free. I just know that it's been twenty years, and my hatred for them and their stupid tradition has just been simmering all this time. Maybe that's why I plan to cut the poor fucker down and be on my way before they can wake up and ask a million questions.
But as I walk around the front of the stake, realization slams into me hard.
It's agirltied out there, if the tits are any indicator.
I can't see her face because of the hat, but I don't need to. She's got a soft body, curves in all the right spots. And yet that beautiful body has been absolutely brutalized. It's clear by the scratches, the blood, the fucking corn husk between her thighs.
Rage floods my veins, and scarlet clouds my vision. I literally see red, everything tainted by the horror of what I just stumbled upon.
She doesn't move as I approach, which makes me wonder if she can't hear me or if she's just really out of it.
The sun's rising fast now, after all. She oughtta be waking from it soon.
I swallow my reservations as I approach and lift the hat off her head.
Golden locks spill forward as her head drops further, obscuring her face. I can see nothing of it to tell if she's awake or in distress, if she's gagged or otherwise silenced.
I don't need to see her face though to know the right thing to do. I cut her down easily, dropping the garden hoe I brought with me so I can saw the ropes loose.
She falls the moment the bonds break, and I catch her against my chest, shock halting my rational brain.
I don't know what to do now.
She's so fucking cold, she's freezing.
Swiping her hair out of her face, I finally get a look at it.
She must have had it painted last night. Now, all that remains of whatever she was dressed as is dark tracks of her makeup streaking down her pale skin, lashes clumped together and crusted with tears, and blue lips.
"Fuck, little wraith."
