The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky (ebook reader for manga TXT) 📕

could want and Thayer for company. Once the films got started and all the moviegoers had their fill of refreshments, we had the lobby to ourselves. (Rob, the Shustrine’s manager, was manning the box office. He locked himself in there pretending to do work, but really he was gambling on his phone.)

“If there was a movie made about your life, who would you want to play you?” Thayer asked.

“Ashley Woodstone, obviously.”

“Yeah, she’d probably grow some freckles just to look like you.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it.”

“I want her to play me, too,” Thayer said. He turned the movie off, which was a good thing because Sleepaway Camp was trudging toward its finale—one of the most mind-boggling endings of all time, and not in an Inception sort of way.

“So, any closer to finalizing your Fear Test, New Girl?”

I gave him the usual answer: “I don’t know when I’m doing my Fear Test, I haven’t chosen my target yet, and when are you going to stop calling me New Girl?”

“When are you going to realize that nicknames are a sign of endearment and intimate friendship?” He got back on topic. “Choosing your target is truly a sacred experience. Don’t waste it like Felicity. She just goes after her latest loser ex. Next year it’ll be whatever masochist dares to date her. But I’ve known Trevor would be my target since I joined the club. The only reason I didn’t pick him last year was because I was a newbie. I needed to stretch my Fear Test muscles first, get the hang of things. Maybe you do, too.”

“Yeah.”

“Or you could just go after her already.”

“I haven’t picked anyone yet,” I said innocently, popping a piece of popcorn into my mouth.

“Sure you haven’t,” Thayer said. “You haven’t almost killed her with a pair of scissors either, and her name doesn’t rhyme with Sucks.”

I’d known he would come to this conclusion. Anyone would. But I told him the same thing I’d been telling myself since the moment I learned about the Fear Tests. “I can’t go after Bram’s girlfriend.”

“That’s nowhere in the rule book, but it sure is sweet.” Thayer’s voice lost its sarcasm but was still coated in something that pointed a big neon arrow at my naivete. It implied that I shouldn’t extend a kindness to Bram that he would never reciprocate for me. And here I was, back to thinking about him. “Why’s Bram such a dick?”

“Bram’s not a dick, he’s broody.” Thayer’s eyes narrowed and smoldered all at once, trying to make the word come alive. “That’s his MO. Everything he does is to live up to it.”

“He’s broody and he’s a dick. The two aren’t mutually exclusive.”

“He’s weird. I mean, none of us are totally aces up here,” Thayer said, pointing to his temple. “If we were normal, we wouldn’t be playing this game.”

“Ahem.”

Thayer and I both turned at the sound of a pointed cough. A guy stood across the counter, tapping the edge of his credit card on the glass surface in slow, annoying clicks.

“Can you not see we’re talking here?” Thayer said. “What do you want?”

“Uh, some Twizzlers?”

Thayer rolled his eyes. “Of course you do.”

He hopped off his stool and bent to get the rubbery vines. I brought up the text app on my phone. Thayer was right. I’d known who my target would be all along. And if Bram wanted to mess with me, then I could mess with him back. I sent out the message quick, before I could change my mind.

My turn to play.

 31

I SAT STILL on a swing in a dark, quiet playground. My Fear Test was about to begin, and sitting on the swing beside mine was my target’s boyfriend.

Suffice to say that it was awkward. Well, more awkward than my usual laugh-a-minute experiences with Bram. But since I’d sent out the text, I’d planned my Fear Test meticulously, worked out every possible angle, and this was the way it had to be.

After a gabfest with Saundra where I’d subtly inched toward the topic of Lux and what she did with her free time, I discovered that Lux had a regular weekly babysitting gig in the Ditmas Park neighborhood in Brooklyn. I was surprised she’d come this far out on the Q line, but Saundra informed me that lots of interesting people (the list began and ended with a couple of actors and a rock band) lived in Ditmas Park. Looking around at the grand manors here, I understood why. The neighborhood was famous for its old Victorian houses, enormous and beautiful with their roof turrets and wraparound porches that didn’t seem to belong in New York City. TV shows filmed here whenever they needed to pretend they were out in the suburbs. Some people had chicken coops in their backyards. The place was a surreal oasis plunked in a gritty city, and that was exactly the vibe I was going for.

The fact that Lux had a regular babysitting gig was almost too perfect. I drew from my favorite kind of horror: psychological. The kind that made you feel dread and unease even though nothing graphic or violent was happening. The kind that messed with your head, the way Lux liked to mess with mine.

We would wait until the kid was asleep and then we would start. Thayer’s role was that of Ambience Manipulator (a title he’d chosen for himself.) He’d subtly change things around the house, just a tiny bit, to get Lux to doubt everything she was seeing. Turn over pictures, manipulate dolls and action figures. Make the inanimate unsettling.

To get Lux on edge, I also put Felicity on door and window duty. She was tasked with tapping windows and turning doorknobs, creating phantom sounds to make Lux think she wasn’t alone.

The whole while, Freddie would be upstairs, where all he had to do was identify the squeakiest parts of the floors and make heavy, slow footsteps.

If Lux still wasn’t freaked out by then, Freddie would get louder.