First Evil (16 page)

“Please—” Corky cried, lowering her hands to her sides. “Stop. Let me go now, okay?”

Jennifer shook her head, her eyes lighting up with pleasure.

“No—please,” Corky begged. “Let me go. What do you want with me?”

A thin smile played over Jennifer's lips. “It's
your
turn to go down there,” she said, pointing into the grave.

“N
o!” Corky tried to back away. But she was trapped, trapped inside the spinning dirt as thick as a garden wall.

Jennifer leaned forward until her eyes burned so close to Corky that she could feel their heat. “Nearly a hundred years I waited. But now I'm alive inside Jennifer, and Jennifer's enemies will pay.” Again she pointed down into the grave. “Now it's your turn, Corky.”

“But why?” Corky cried. “I haven't done anything to you.”

“Haven't
done
anything? You and your sister—with your perfect faces? Your perfect bodies? Your perfect lives?”

“But—” Corky turned her head, tried to get away from the searing heat of the evil, burning eyes.

A bitter smile formed on Jennifer's eerily glowing face. “But I showed Bobbi. I showed Bobbi and that boy, Chip.”

“You frightened them,” Corky said, realizing what had happened, realizing that her sister's wild stories were all true. “You paralyzed them. And then—you killed Bobbi,” Corky said, choking out the words.

Jennifer nodded once and locked her eyes on Corky. “Now it's your turn.”

“No! Jennifer—
wait!”
Corky screamed.

The evil spirit inside Jennifer's body laughed scornfully. She pointed at her feet. “Look down there, Corky dear. Look down at your new home.”

Corky, too frightened to disobey, turned her eyes down.

With another wave of Jennifer's hand, more dirt flew up into the swirling dirt funnel. As the dirt rose up in eerie silence, Corky stared down into a deep hole. To her horror, the hole revealed the top of a coffin, the dark wood swollen and warped.

“See your new home—and your new friend!” the evil spirit cried in its hoarse, dead voice.

“Oh!” Corky moaned weakly as the coffin lid creaked open.

Still compelled to peer down into the darkness, Corky watched the lid lift all the way up.

Inside the coffin, she saw a rotting skeleton, its eyeless skull staring up at her with a toothy grin.

The skeleton was moving. Quivering all over.

No.

Staring hard, unable to remove her eyes from the ghastly sight, Corky saw why the skeleton appeared to quiver.

Those were worms moving on the bones, thousands of white worms slithering over the skeleton, crawling over the rotting remains of Sarah Fear.

“Oh!” Corky felt her stomach heave, felt her throat tighten in disgust.

She shut her eyes and turned away, but the sight of the thousands of slithering white worms stayed with her.

Swallowing hard, trying to shake away the horrifying picture, she suddenly heard voices. Far away yet familiar.

For a brief, terrifying moment, she thought it was the voice of Sarah Fear, calling to her from down in the open grave.

But then she recognized Kimmy's voice. And heard Debra's reply. And Ronnie's frightened shout.

The voices sounded far away because they came from outside the wall of dirt.

They must have followed me, Corky realized.

“Your friends are too late to save you,” Jennifer said calmly, without urgency. She raised both hands.

“No—please!” Corky screamed. “Please—don't!”

Ignoring her cries, Jennifer shoved Corky with startling strength, inhuman strength.

Still screaming, Corky toppled into the hole, down to join Sarah Fear in the open, worm-ridden coffin.

D
own into the hole. Into the warped, swollen coffin.

Down to the white worms.

But even in her screaming terror, Corky's body responded, remembering the cheerleading skills, the moves her body had practiced over the years until they had become reflexive, a part of her.

She landed hard on her feet. Absorbed the pressure of the landing by bending her knees. Then pushed up, up—into a high standing jump. Raised her hands. Caught the top of the open grave as the wall of dirt began to swirl back down on her. Pulled herself up and out as the dirt began to lower itself back into the hole.

Panting loudly, she crawled away from the hole, away from the horror.

Jennifer had already turned away, turned around to face the three cheerleaders.

Still acting by reflex, her mind still paralyzed by the horrors of the open grave, her body forced to act on its own, Corky flung herself on Jennifer. Caught her from behind. Wrapped her arms around Jennifer's waist. Swung her back toward the open grave.

She struggled to wrestle Jennifer into the hole. Into the coffin. To wrestle the evil spirit back to where it belonged, as the dirt continued to rain down, down, down.

Jennifer cried out in her husky, deep voice, trying to pull out of Corky's desperate hug.

The pennant, which she had clutched all the while, fell from her hand. Corky watched it drop into the hole. It landed silently among the bones and worms.

They wrestled nearer to the edge of the hole. Corky pulled, pulled with all her strength, tightening her arms around Jennifer's waist, trying to throw her down.

Jennifer pulled back, crying out in protest.

Closer to the hole. Closer to the edge.

I can do it! Corky thought. I can do it!

But then Jennifer turned to face her, her eyes wild with fury. She opened her mouth wide, wider—and a wind blew out, a stench, a vapor, a wind that howled over Corky, covered her face, filled her nostrils.

Jennifer tilted her head, closed her eyes, and the vapor roared out of her, reeking of death, of decay, of all that is foul.

It blew into Corky's face, hot and wet and sour. Corky gagged and turned her face.

But the wind still howled out of Jennifer's mouth,
encircled Corky and choked her in its thick, hot stench.

I'm going to suffocate, she thought.

I can't breathe. I'm going to suffocate. The smell. The smell is too sickening!

Corky realized she was weakening, about to lose the fight.

One last tug. She held her breath and braced herself, summoned all of her remaining strength for one last tug.

Now!
she told herself.

And heaved with all her might, her arms wrapped tightly around Jennifer's waist.

Into the grave! Corky thought.
Jennifer—go down into the grave!

But Jennifer was too strong.

The foul wind raged and howled from her open mouth.

Jennifer didn't budge.

I'm lost, Corky thought.

C
orky felt her arms slip off Jennifer's waist. I'm lost. I'm lost.

As the dirt rained down, she could suddenly hear the terrified cries of the three girls.

Jennifer's eyes were open wide as the sour wind howled from her mouth. She knew she had won. She knew her evil had triumphed.

First Bobbi. Now me, Corky thought.

Bobbi. Bobbi.

The thought of her sister filled her with renewed anger. With an anguished cry, Corky threw herself onto Jennifer's back and wrapped her hands around Jennifer's throat from behind.

Jennifer struggled as Corky tightened her grip, tightened her hands, began to choke Jennifer, choke the evil spirit inside Jennifer's body, pushing her head down.

The raging stream of foul vapor from Jennifer's mouth blew into the hole now, into the open grave. Corky could see it, blowing the worms around in the coffin.

“Yes!” she cried aloud, hearing the wind lose its howl, feeling it weaken as it poured into the coffin.

All the evil pouring down into the coffin.

And as Corky continued to choke her, Jennifer felt lighter, lighter. Light as air.

And the wind stopped. Jennifer uttered a feeble groan, and the wind stopped.

“Yes!” Corky cried, not loosening her grip on Jennifer's throat.

The evil spirit is abandoning her, Corky thought.

She could feel it leaving, could feel Jennifer's body growing light.

Corky let go.

Jennifer lay facedown in the dirt.

Corky watched as the coffin lid slammed shut, trapping the evil vapor, trapping the evil spirit inside.

The dirt rained down in a dark, thunderous avalanche, filling the hole, re-covering the grave.

Buried. The evil spirit is buried again, Corky thought, gasping in the cool, sweet air, the clean air, letting the fresh night air fill her lungs.

She realized she was still on her knees in the soft dirt.

“Corky—!” Kimmy was screaming.

The three girls were standing right in front of her, peering at the grave in horror. They had seen it all, seen every moment of Corky's desperate battle. Now they huddled around her.

“Corky—are you
okay?”
Ronnie cried.

All four of them turned their eyes to Jennifer's body. Slowly Corky rolled her over so she was face up. “Ohh,” Kimmy groaned.

Ronnie gagged and held on to Debra to keep from sinking to her knees.

As the girls gaped in silent horror, Jennifer's skin dried and crumpled, flaking off in chunks. Her long hair fell off, strands blowing away in the breeze. Her eyes sank back into her skull, then rotted into dark pits. Her cheerleader costume appeared to grow larger as her flesh decayed underneath it, and her bones appeared.

Before Corky realized what was happening, she felt Kimmy's arm slide around her shoulders. “It's okay, Corky,” Kimmy whispered. “You're okay now. It's all going to be okay.”

And then they heard a man's voice calling from the street. “What's going on here?”

Darting beams from flashlights danced over the ground. The girls looked up into the suspicious faces of two uniformed Shadyside officers.

“What's going on here? One of the neighbors reported a—”

Both of the young officers gasped in surprise as they saw the body sprawled on the ground beside the four girls, the body draped in a cheerleader's costume.

“What on earth—?”

“It's Jennifer,” Corky managed to say from the midst of her confusion. “It's Jennifer Daly. I followed her here. She—”

“Huh?” Both police directed their lights from the body to Corky's face. “You followed her here? Are you sure, miss?”

“Yes. I followed her here. She was dancing—”

“You didn't follow this girl, miss,” the policeman said, eyeing Corky intently. “This girl hasn't been dancing tonight. Take a good look at the corpse. This girl has been dead for weeks!”

♦ ♦ ♦

Jennifer's anguished parents, awakened and summoned to the police station, had demanded answers.

But there were no reasonable answers, no logical answers.

Corky's parents had also arrived, as upset and confused as everyone else. They had waited patiently with their daughter during the hours of questioning, the police asking the same questions again and again, dissatisfied with the answers they received from Corky and the other three girls.