18

12:00 A.M.

MONSTER

Rex shambled back across the desert like a zombie.

His face was pale, his hands shaking as they had immediately after his transformation weeks before. He looked strangely like his father - eyes glazed and milky, his gait barely a shuffle.

He wasn't bruised or bleeding, and his clothes weren't torn, but the empty expression on his face made Jessica's skin crawl.

"Are you okay, Rex?" she said.

He didn't answer, just turned to Melissa. "Did you touch her?"

"No, I waited. I promised, didn't I?" Melissa reached toward him. "Loverboy, you look like crap."

"Feel like it too." Rex took her offered hand and shuddered, then straightened, as if taking strength from her. "Thanks."

"What the hell, Rex?" Jonathan said. "Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

Rex thought about the question for a few seconds, like it was a tricky one, but finally he shook his head. "I'm just trying to get all points of view. I think I've been a pretty crappy historian."

"Pretty crappy driver, more like!" Melissa cried. She pointed at the old Ford, which was listing to one side; both tires on the right were reduced almost to bare metal rims. "The first time I let you take my car somewhere without me, and you totally kill it?"

"Yeah. Looks that way."

"I can't believe you, Rex! Mr. Responsible, who always gets his library books back on time, but when it comes to my car, you don't even bother to use the road? The front axle's busted!"

As Jessica watched Melissa continue her tirade - holding Rex tighter with every insult, their fingers intertwining, their bodies leaning against each other for support - she realized how well the mindcaster had concealed her fear that he might never return. Even when they'd touched, Jessica had only caught a glimpse.

Finally Melissa's diatribe sputtered to a halt. Rex held her in silence for a moment, then said, "I'll always remember the old beast fondly. It died saving me and Angie."

Melissa pulled away and turned to stare at the frozen figure in the wrecked car, her voice lowering to a growl. "Well, she's my consolation prize, then. She really owes me now."

"Wait a second," Rex said.

"No way. I've already waited too long for this."

He drew Melissa back to him, placing one palm against her cheek.

After a moment her eyes widened. "What? Why not?"

"I made a deal."

"Well, I didn't make any deal!"

"You did. With me." He shook his head. "We have to wait for midnight to end."

Jessica wondered if anyone else was having trouble following this. "What are you talking about?"

"Yeah," Dess added, still holding a bloody rag to the cut above her left eye. "Could those of us who aren't psychic at least get some subtitles?"

Melissa yanked herself out of Rex's arms, stumbling back a few feet and glaring at him. "He doesn't want me to mindcast Angie."

"Excuse me?" Dess said.

"Angie's told me some things about the past," Rex said. "About midnighters and Grayfoots. And we made a deal. We're going to wait till midnight ends, then we'll talk to her. Just talk."

"Hang on," Jonathan said. "Are you saying we all risked our lives tonight to have a chat?"

"No way!" Dess cried.

Rex looked at Jessica, his exhausted eyes asking for her help. "We don't have to use mindcasting," he said. "We can trust her."

"To what?" Melissa spat. "Kidnap us less often?"

"I'm not saying Angie's our friend or anything," he said, his gaze not wavering from Jessica. "Far from it. But she is like us in one way: she wants to learn the truth about midnight. We don't have to take her thoughts against her will."

Jessica drew in a slow breath. The night they'd rescued Cassie Flinders, she'd tried to talk them out of erasing the girl's memories, and they'd basically ignored her. But if Rex himself was actually having second thoughts, maybe this time it wouldn't have to work out that way.

"I agree with Rex," she said. "I think."

The other three stared at her, and Jessica half expected one of them to shout, Who cares what you think? But as the silence stretched out, she felt something shift within the group. Even Melissa's manic energy seemed to fade a little, like a child's tantrum left unanswered.

Jessica crossed her arms. Apparently they did care what she thought.

After a long moment Dess said quietly, "So let me get this straight. I'm bleeding here. An inch lower and psycho-kitty would have taken out my eye. And we're just going to talk to her, which would imply that we could have done this with a phone call?"

"Possibly resulting in less damage to my car?" Melissa said.

"Not really," Rex said. "Here in person you can make sure Angie isn't lying. I believe her, but the rest of you also have to be certain." He let out a short laugh. "And frankly, I don't think it would have worked this way on the phone. Sometimes a little shared danger helps."

"Well, no problem then, you two wrecking my car," Melissa said, "as long as you bonded."

"No, no." Rex shook his head tiredly. "My bonding tonight happened out there. Angie's just confused."

"Confused!" Melissa groaned. "She's a kidnapper, Rex. She should be in jail forever! And nothing happens to her?"

He smiled, his eyes flashing with the dark moon's light.

"I didn't say that."

As the dark moon set, real time swept across the desert, followed by the sudden return of the cold autumn wind. Next to Jessica, Rex jumped a little, like dishes left behind by a yanked tablecloth - as if he didn't belong in normal time anymore.

He had refused to answer their questions about what had happened to him out in the desert, saying he couldn't remember. Not yet, anyway.

In that same instant Angie's face sprang to life, emotions fluttering across it like a TV flipping through channels: confusion, fear, suspicion, and finally lots more confusion. She touched her own head gingerly with her fingertips, as if checking to make sure her ears hadn't fallen off at the stroke of midnight.

The five of them were standing in a row in front of the car, arms crossed - sort of like a band posing for an album cover, Jessica thought. Even the still-seething Melissa had decided to join them, once she realized that this little moment of surprise was the only revenge she would get to wreak on Angie.

The woman's eyes widened as she saw them through the front windshield.

"Come on out," Rex called. "Let's talk."

Angie slowly pulled herself out from the battered Ford and stood facing them, staying behind the protection of the open car door.

"Wow," she said softly.

Jessica guessed that people appearing out of nowhere might be a lot more impressive than a few dominoes jumping around.

"How's your mind doing?" Rex asked. "Still feel like yourself?"

Angie puzzled over that one for a moment, then shrugged. "I guess so."

"Like I would dirty my hands with your rank little brain," Melissa said.

Jessica gave her a sidelong glance. So not true.

"Then let's talk about the history of Bixby," Rex said.

"I thought we already covered that."

"Maybe I want to hear it all again." He patted Melissa's shoulder. "And this time I can be sure you're telling the truth. Or at least, if you think you're telling the truth."

"It's all true," Angie said. "I can show you the documents."

"Just talk," Rex said.

Angie nodded and began telling them all about the early midnighters, the Grayfoots' revolution, and the rest of the other secret history of Bixby. She started slowly and softly, her baffled expression at their sudden appearance taking a while to fade. But gradually her voice gained in strength, and soon she was declaiming with the utmost confidence.

Rex had already explained most of it to them while they'd waited for the blue time to end, but as Jessica heard the revelations repeated in Angie's methodical tones, the story began to settle in her bones alongside the desert chill of the Oklahoma autumn night.

If this was all true, then how much had Madeleine known about everything that had gone on back in her day? She'd only been seventeen when the Grayfoots had swept the midnighters from power, but she carried the memories of generations of mindcasters. Wouldn't she know about it if midnighters had been doing creepy things for thousands of years?

And would any of them have the guts to ask her what she thought about all this? Of course, Melissa wouldn't have much choice in the matter the next time the two of them touched. Jessica was just glad it would be Melissa, and not her, doing the asking.

By the time Angie drew her lecture to a close, she didn't seem scared of them anymore. She was smoking now, looking at them like they were just kids.

"So now that I've explained reality to you," Angie finished, "what are you going to tell me in return?"

Jessica narrowed her eyes at the woman. She was glad Melissa hadn't turned her into a drooling idiot, but that didn't mean she liked Angie. Not at all.

"Here's the main thing you need to know," Rex said.

"As far as we can tell, all hell's going to break loose on November first."

"The midnight before, actually," Dess added. "When October 31 rolls over into November."

Angie smirked. "Midnight on Halloween, huh?"

"It may sound cheesy," Dess said coolly. "But numbers don't lie."

"I don't know if I believe all that numerology stuff."

"Numerology?" Dess's jaw dropped open. "This is math, you dimwit."

The woman stared at Dess skeptically for a long moment, but then a troubled look crossed her face. "You know, before they cut me off, Ernesto Grayfoot kept saying that something was arriving soon. And after the darklings stopped answering, everyone started getting anxious about it. He said it had to do with the flame-bringer." She looked at Jessica. "That's you, right?"

Jessica nodded.

"But the Grayfoots never got all their instructions before the halfling died."

"What exactly did Ernesto say?" Rex asked.

"All he told me was a name - the old man was nervous because 'Samhain' was coming." She shrugged. "He never told me who that was."

Melissa shook her head. "Not 'who,' dimwit, when. Samhain is the ancient name for Halloween."

"Spot the goth," Dess muttered.

"Like you should talk," Melissa answered.

"Halloween again." Rex sighed tiredly. "Can't seem to get away from it."

"Come on, you guys. Don't be stupid," Angie said. "Halloween's just pop culture nonsense. It didn't exist here in Oklahoma until a hundred years ago, and as I've explained to you, the monsters got here a lot earlier than that." Her gaze drifted across the five of them. "They're still here."

"Monsters?" Rex said. He took a step toward Angie, then another, and Jessica felt a nervous tingling in the bottom of her stomach. Something was changing in Rex, exhaustion leaving his frame. He seemed suddenly taller, his expression harder, a threat implicit in every line of his face. Then the most astonishing thing - Jessica saw his eyes flash violet, though the dark moon had long set.

He was arm's length from Angie, but the woman stumbled backward, shrinking against the broken car. The cigarette dropped from her fingers.

"Maybe you're right, Angie," he said. "Maybe monsters have lived in Bixby for a long, long time. But you should just remember one thing."

His voice changed then, turning dry and cold, as if something ancient was speaking through him. "Monster or not, I'm what you made me when you left me out in the desert. I'm your nightmare now."

A hissing sound came from him then, and his neck stretched forward, as if his head were straining to leave his shoulders. His fingers seemed to grow longer and thinner, cutting the air in mesmerizing patterns. The hiss sliced through Jessica's nervous system like a piece of broken glass traveling down her spine.

Angie's smug confidence melted, and she slumped down, only her back against the Ford holding her from sinking to the dirt.

The hissing faded until it was lost in the wind, and then Rex's body seemed to fold into itself again, back to its normal human size and shape. Jessica wasn't sure if she'd really seen him change so completely or if the whole thing had been a massive psych-out.

He turned away from Angie. "Come on, guys."

"But she knows more," Melissa said.

"Not anything important. They told me what I really need to know."

His voice was normal again, and as Rex strode toward Jonathan's car, he looked tired, the energy that had coursed through his body during the sudden transformation now gone.

Jessica and Jonathan cast a wary glance at each other, then followed Melissa, who was trailing worriedly after Rex.

"What about her?" Dess called. Jessica paused and glanced over her shoulder; Dess was looking down at Angie as if she were a particularly interesting bug found smashed against the ground.

Rex didn't turn back, just spoke to the empty desert in front of him.

"She's walking. She knows the way out of town."

19

6:23 P.M.

SPAGHETTI SITUATION

"The rule is in force tonight," Beth announced.

Jessica glanced up from her physics textbook. "Um, Beth? I'd like to point out that I am in my own bedroom, not in the kitchen. Therefore there is no possible way that I can be found in violation of the rule."

"I'm just warning you," Beth answered.

"Warning me?" Jessica said with a look of annoyance.

It was Beth Spaghetti Night, which meant that her little sister was cooking dinner. Over the last four years, since Beth had turned nine, the ritual had been held every Wednesday night, interrupted only in the first few tumultuous weeks after the family had arrived in Bixby.

The one rule of Beth Spaghetti Night was simple: Beth cooked, and everyone else had to stay away from the food.

Even now, the scent of reducing onions was already drifting through Jessica's open door. The familiar smell had been making her happy until this interruption.

"Warning me about what exactly?"

"That I am enforcing the rule in its maximum form tonight," Beth said.

"What does that mean? That we all have to leave the house while you cook?"

"No, but just..." Beth wrinkled her nose and checked over her shoulder, as if the smell of something burning had reached her. "Just stay in here. Okay, Jess?"

"Why?"

Beth smiled. "It's a surprise."

Jessica considered getting Mom to pass judgment on this new and irksome interpretation of the rule, but it probably wasn't worth the effort. Jessica had been planning on studying until dinner anyway, and maybe the threat of Beth's irritation would keep her from winding up in front of the TV.

Physics was Jessica's only test scheduled before Halloween, and it seemed a shame for the world to end on a D+.

"Please?"

"Sure. Whatever," Jessica said, making sure to roll her eyes.

"Good.You'll like my little surprise."

"Okay" Beth's smug expression didn't reassure Jessica. "Can't wait for it."

"Can I close your door?"

Jessica groaned. "Don't I smell something burning, Beth?"

Her little sister spun on one heel, an expression of alarm crossing her face. Something really was burning. But she still managed to slam the door closed behind her as she fled.

Jessica listened to her footsteps thundering back toward the kitchen, wondering what this "surprise" was. Beth had been much easier to get along with in the last week, snooping a lot less, talking about her new friends at marching band, and practicing her twirls. Maybe she really did want to surprise them all with something special.

And even if she wanted to make trouble, Beth could hardly have anything up her sleeve that would really make things worse.

There hadn't been any more eclipses - or timequakes, or whatevers of the prime whatever - since lunchtime a week ago. But as far as Melissa could tell, the darklings were expecting another one soon. After the last eclipse the rip in Jenks had grown to roughly the size of an oval-shaped tennis court. One of them checked it every midnight now, just to make sure that no more normal people had fallen through. Along with the usual blue glow everything inside it was tinged with red and nothing was frozen - autumn leaves fell, earthworms crawled, mosquitoes buzzed and bit. Too weird for words.

According to Dess, every eclipse would make the rip larger, like a tear traveling down a set of old stockings. Finally on Halloween the fabric of the secret hour would fall apart, and everyone for miles in all directions would find themselves engulfed in a world of red-blue.

As Jessica scanned her physics textbook, trying to focus on a chapter called "Waves and You," images of last Wednesday night kept popping into her mind - the way Rex had looked as he stumbled back across the desert, as pale as a prisoner released after years in a tiny, lightless cell. The way he had transformed into something inhuman in his anger.

Rex said he still couldn't remember what had happened to him out in the desert, and even Melissa hadn't gotten far enough down into his mind to dredge up anything. He said he was having weird dreams, though, like ancient darkling memories running through his head in high definition. All from one conversation with the old ones in the desert.

It had been more of a brainwashing session than a conversation, as far as Jessica could tell. Or maybe a whole bodywashing - his freaky transformation seemed to make Angie's accusations come true, as if Rex really was a monster now.

Jessica shivered at the image and gave up trying to concentrate on toroidal and sinusoidal waves. Instead she closed her eyes and drew in the smell of tomato sauce filtering under her door. If everything was about to change, Jessica wanted to relish these few last slices of normality.

Only two more Wednesdays before Samhain. She might as well enjoy Beth Spaghetti Night while it lasted.

"Dinnertime!" Beth shouted from right outside the door.

Jessica jerked out of her reverie, blinking. "Thanks for scaring me."

"No problem." Footsteps scampered down the hall.

Jessica smiled. Spastically enthusiastic Beth she could deal with. Rolling off the bed and to her feet, she paused to stretch away the muscle kinks of too much studying, then opened her door.

The mouthwatering scent of Beth's tomato sauce rolled toward her from the kitchen, and the house echoed with the sounds of her whole family in animated conversation. Just for tonight, she could pretend that everything was normal here in Bixby.

But as Jessica made her way down the hall, a stranger's voice spoke up, gentle but certain of itself - and somehow vaguely familiar.

"No way," she said softly. Beth was talking again now; she must have misheard.

But dread grew in Jessica as she reached the kitchen doorway and looked down at the empty table - for the first time since they'd arrived in Bixby, the dining table had been set.

Which meant that company was here.

She went through the kitchen and into the dining room until she found herself facing the four of them: Beth, Mom, Dad...

And Cassie Flinders.

"Hey, Jess!" Mom said. "Beth brought a friend home from school today."

Jessica managed only a zombified, "Oh, yeah?"

"Cassie's in marching band with me," Beth said, an amused smile playing on her lips. She turned to the girl. "I told you about my sister, Jessica."

Cassie Flinders looked her up and down, as if comparing her with some mental checklist.

"Hi," Jessica squeaked, her voice gone all tinny and her mind racing.

Hadn't Rex and Melissa gone back out to Jenks and dealt with Cassie's memories? Wasn't this kid supposed to have only the vaguest recollections of her moments in the blue time?

"I think we've met," Cassie finally said.

"Really?" Mom said, all smiles. "Where was that?"

"Yeah, where?" Jessica said, taking her seat in front of the empty plate, trying to keep her voice normal and her expression only mildly puzzled instead of totally flabbergasted. "I don't think I remember."

"I don't remember either, exactly." Cassie's eyes were still scanning Jessica's face, as if recording her features in great detail. "But I drew a picture of you."

"You did what?"

Cassie shrugged. "Drew a picture, with a pencil. The other day when I was sick."

"Yeah," Beth said. "And it's a really good one. She brought it in to show around. You can really tell it's you, Jess. Cassie draws all the time."

"But you two don't remember meeting?" Mom asked.

"No, not at all," Jessica said. "I mean, I've never even been to Jenks."

"Jenks?" Beth said, smiling radiantly. "How did you know Cassie lived out there?"

"I don't know... how I knew that," Jessica said slowly. Now even Mom and Dad were looking at her funny. She realized that it would be better if the conversation moved along. "So, um, are you a majorette too?"

"No. I play clarinet."

"And she's a really good artist," Beth repeated.

"Yes," Jessica said. "I got that."

"She also has this other drawing of this guy," Beth said. "What was the name you wrote on it? Jonath - "

"Oh, hang on!" Jessica said, playing the only card she could be certain would change the subject. "Aren't you, like, Cassie Flinders?"

No one answered for a second, then Cassie nodded slowly.

"Now, Jess," her mother said. "I'm sure Cassie doesn't want to talk about that stuff last week, okay?"

"Sorry." She shrugged. "But I mean, it was on the news and everything."

"Jessica."

She didn't say anything more, just let Beth serve the pasta, slithering spaghetti onto their plates and glopping sauce on top of it as the awkwardness stretched out.

Uncomfortable silences were fine with Jessica, definitely better than the uncomfortable noises coming out of Beth's mouth. The pause in the conversation gave her a few minutes to figure out what had happened.

According to Rex, Melissa had checked Cassie's brain to make sure she hadn't spilled the beans. But maybe instead of blabbing about what she'd seen, she'd drawn it.

Jessica wondered what other pictures Cassie had made before her memory had been erased. One of Jonathan, apparently, and probably she'd sketched the other midnighters as well. And she might have written their names down too.

Had she drawn the black cat slither or the darkling she'd seen?

Everyone started eating, and soon Beth and Cassie were telling stories about how geeky the rest of the marching band was, acting like nothing weird or unexplained had been mentioned at the table.

Jessica wondered if the drawings would jog Cassie's memories, pulling them out of whatever corner of her mind Melissa had stuffed them into. Or if seeing Jessica in person would make her recall more of what had happened that night.

Still, Cassie didn't have much to go on - just a few names and half-remembered faces and maybe a black cat or monstrous spider straight out of a nightmare. She had no way to connect Jessica and Jonathan to the other midnighters, no more clues about what had really happened that day.

Cassie Flinders wasn't really the problem.

As usual, Beth was.

She had already recognized Jonathan's face and probably remembered from taking phone messages that Jessica had friends named Rex and Dess and Melissa. Worst of all, Beth knew that Jessica liked to sneak out at midnight - the time when the growing rip in Jenks was at its most dangerous.

And - as Jessica knew from long experience - if anyone could turn a small amount of information into a big pain in the ass, Beth could.

Jessica wondered about Rex's new policy against mindcasting. He hadn't let Melissa mess with Angie's brain, but Angie had known all about the secret hour for years. This was a different matter entirely. If rumors started to spread around Bixby Junior High that weird things happened near the Jenks railroad line at midnight, Rex might make an exception for little sisters.

Jessica decided not to mention any of this to him or even think about it too hard around Melissa. A quick look into Beth's brain would reveal that she knew more about midnight than was safe.

Way more, now that she was friends with Cassie Flinders.

Jessica kept eating, trying to enjoy the mingled tastes of long-simmered tomatoes, number 18 spaghetti, and almost-too-many reduced onions. But as dinner continued - Beth glancing at Jessica knowingly whenever she got a chance - the familiar flavors turned bitter in her mouth.

"Mom?" Beth said as the meal drew to a close.

"Yeah?"

"Can I go spend the night with Cassie sometime?"

Jessica watched as her parents' faces broke into smiles. Marching band had paid off, big time. Beth had finally made a friend here in the new town. Everything would be much easier from now on.

"Of course you can," Mom said.

Beth smiled, and her gaze turned to her older sister, making sure to show that she knew there were more clues to find, more trouble to make, out there in Jenks.

Jessica tried to put on an innocent expression, as if nothing tonight had disturbed her, but she felt the smile wither on her face.

It was just too depressing. Even Beth Spaghetti Night had been touched by the blue time.

P/S: Copyright -->www_novelfreereadonline_Com

***