A Place So Wicked by Patrick Reuman (life books to read txt) 📕

Paisley, she seemed fine, leaving him to wonder if the sudden cold was in his head. He started toward the room’s exit.

“Wait! I’m coming,” Paisley said, hurrying to get behind her brother.

Toby led, his sister in tow, down the hall. As they passed the stairs, the taps came again, this time very slightly louder. He begged that they not be coming from the basement. He pleaded for any other thing. But that direction was exactly where the sound seemed to be coming from.

As they neared the end of the hall, the corner just ahead, and the basement just around that corner, the knocks returned. The taps were quicker this time, as if the entity behind them was getting frustrated with how slowly they were moving up the hall.

They went around the corner, stopping in front of the door that led down. He wasn’t going to open it unless he had to. Even if the knocks came again, right then, right next to him, from the other side of the door, he wasn’t going to answer it.

TAP, TAP, TAP. They jerked to their left, away from the basement door. They weren’t coming from the basement, but rather, just past the basement, from the back door. Just seconds later, as they stepped further along the way, they saw Eli standing on the other side of the back door, his face peering in through the glass.

31

Relief washed over the both of them at the sight of Eli. Toby turned the deadbolt with a light click then eased the door open slowly. He whispered for Eli to come in. They hadn’t told their parents anybody was coming over. He wasn’t sure they would even care, but in their present state, he really couldn’t be certain.

Eli entered sounding exhausted, like he was stepping inside from a wild rainstorm, except the skies were clear and there was no rain. He immediately clenched his nose upon entering and shrieked a quiet grunt.

“Oh my god, what the hell is that?”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. It’s the basement, we think,” Paisley said.

“Come this way,” Toby said.

He led them to the living room where the smell wasn’t better but merely slightly less intolerable. When they were safely around the corner, Toby offered Eli a spot on the couch, which he took. They sat there for a moment in silence, the living room in darkness. They hadn’t had the light on a few minutes ago because it was still light out, the sun still hanging above in the sky, but, as if out of nowhere, everything had plunged into darkness.

“So,” Eli said, clearly fighting not to be bothered by the smell of the place. “You wanted to talk to me?”

Toby nodded. “Do you know Robert? He lives on the next road over, Cherry Hill.”

“I’m not sure. Do you know his last name?”

“No. Sorry.”

“I’m not sure, then. Why?”

Toby retold the story to Eli, in the finest detail he could manage. Staring into the distance, into the darkness of their living room, he allowed the emotions he felt earlier when first hearing Robert’s story to surge through his body as he recounted everything. When he finished, Eli looked almost as bad as Toby felt. Eli just stared at them for a very long minute.

“We were hoping you could help us,” Paisley said.

Eli looked both surprised and as if everything Toby had just said was yesterday’s news. The boy shifted uncomfortably, inching himself back into the corner of the couch like a scared animal. When he finally met Paisley’s eyes, he looked like he was near tears.

“Yes.” The word came out dry, like he was on the edge of death, stranded out in a desert, his lips cracked from the scorching heat.

“Yes, what?” Toby said.

Eli’s eyes were glistening now, his face a light shade of red. He was struggling to meet either of their eyes but especially Paisley’s. He tried to wipe his eyes discreetly, even though the other two were watching him.

“Everything you just said, I think, is all true,” Eli said, looking down at the floor. “About the house, and everything else.”

“So, we’re sacrifices?” Toby blurted out.

“You knew?” was all Paisley could manage before tears started to flow. She stood. “I told you that my brother was sick, and you knew?! And you didn’t say anything?”

“I don’t know!” Eli said. “I really don’t. I—I—”

Toby stood as well. “We have to get everybody out of here!”

Eli reached and grabbed Toby’s arm as he turned. “No! You can’t!”

Eli rose, looking out the window, and in every direction, as if expecting something to materialize out of the walls.

“What the hell do you mean, I can’t?” Toby realized how loud he was being and hushed himself. “You just said our house is literally killing us!”

“I know. I know.” Eli stepped out of the light’s path, where streetlamps cascaded their yellow hue through the window’s glass. “But you can’t just leave. They won’t let you.”

Toby froze, his anger quickly replaced by an emotion somewhere between fear and foreboding. They. Eli hadn’t said it yet, but Toby was already sure that Eli’s they was the same they that Robert’s mother had talked about. But who exactly “they” were, he didn’t know yet.

“Who is they? What do you mean?” Paisley asked.

“I—” Eli stuttered again. “I’m not entirely sure. But as soon as you try to leave, as soon as they know that you know what is going on, they—”

“They’ll come,” Toby said. “Like they did for Robert when they somehow found out he had told me. They’ll come for us.”

Eli nodded his head, his eyes completely expressionless. “That’s why I didn’t tell you, Paisley. I was scared.”

Paisley tried to talk, but Eli quickly pushed on. “I know! It’s a terrible excuse. The worst. And I’m so sorry. But bad