The Haunted Mask II (5 page)

Why was I so nervous?

The scary part was over. I had escaped with one of the great masks. Now it
was my turn to scare
other
people. Why was I standing there scaring
myself?

Still holding the front of my sweatshirt, I pushed open the front door and
stepped into the house. “Down, boy! Get down, Sparky!” I cried as the little
black terrier greeted me. He leaped high off the floor, bouncing off me, barking and whining as if he hadn’t seen
me in twenty years.

“Get down, Sparky! Down!”

I wanted to sneak into the house, run up to my room, and stash the mask away
before my parents heard me return. But Sparky ruined that plan.

“Steve—is that you?” Mom stormed into the living room, a fretful frown on
her face. She glared at me and angrily blew a curl of blond hair from in front
of her eyes. “Where on earth were you? Your father and I went ahead and ate
dinner. Yours is ice-cold by now!”

“Sorry, Mom,” I said, still holding the front of my sweatshirt to keep the
mask in place as I tried to push Sparky away.

The lock of hair fell back over her forehead. She blew at it again. “Well?
Where
were
you?”

“I… well…”

Think fast, Steve.

You can’t tell her you sneaked out to steal a Halloween mask from the
basement of a store.

“I had to help Chuck with something,” I finally answered.

Sure, it was a lie. But it wasn’t a serious lie.

I’m usually a very honest guy. But right then, all I cared about was having
the mask! I had it, and I was desperate to get it out from under my sweatshirt
and hidden in a safe place in my room.

“Well, you should have told me where you were going,” Mom scolded. “Your father went out to do the grocery shopping. But
he’s very angry, too. You should have been home for dinner.”

I lowered my head. “Sorry, Mom.”

Sparky gazed up at me. Was he staring at the bulge in my sweatshirt?

If the dog could see it, Mom could see it too.

“I’ll take off my coat and come right down,” I told her.

I didn’t give her a chance to reply. I spun around, leaped onto the stairs,
and ran up two at a time. I flew down the hall, burst into my room, and slammed
the door behind me.

I took a few seconds to catch my breath. I listened hard, making sure that
Mom hadn’t followed me upstairs.

No. I could hear her banging around in the kitchen, getting my dinner ready.

I couldn’t
wait
to check out the mask!

Which one did I take? When the light came on in the store basement, I grabbed
a mask without looking. I stuffed it under my sweatshirt before I could see it.

Now I eagerly reached under the sweatshirt and pulled out my hard-won prize.

“Wow!” I raised it in both hands and admired it.

The old-man mask. I took the mask of the creepy old man.

I smoothed out its long strings of yellow-white hair. Holding it by the big,
pointy ears, I lifted it in front of my face and examined it closely.

A single white tooth hung down over the bottom lip. A brown wormhole poked
through the center of the tooth.

Outside on the front stoop, the big tooth had scraped my chest, I realized.
That’s what made me think the mask was biting me.

The mouth was twisted in an evil sneer. The lips curled like two brown worms.

The long nose had gobs of green dripping from each nostril. A square patch of
skin was missing just above the forehead. I could see gray skull bone in the
hole.

The whole face was creased and lined. The flesh was a sickly green. The skin
appeared to be peeling off the face. Dark scabs bulged from the sunken cheeks.

Black spiders appeared to crawl through the stringy, yellow hair. Spiders
poked out of the two ears.

“Yuck!” I cried.

Was I holding the scariest Halloween mask in the world?

No. In the universe!

I began to feel a little queasy just holding it. I rubbed the scabby cheek
with one finger. The skin felt warm, like real skin.

“Heh-heh-heh.” I practiced laughing like an old man. “Heh-heh-heh.” I tried a
dry cackle.

Look out, Hogs! I told myself. When I come leaping out at you on Halloween
night in this mask, you will jump out of your skins!

“Heh-heh-heh.”

I raked the ugly, long hair back over the head. My fingers bumped over the
spiders tangled in the hair. The spiders didn’t feel rubbery. They felt soft and
warm like the skin.

I gazed down happily at the disgusting, old face. It sneered back at me. The
brown worm lips quivered.

Should I try it on?

I carried it over to the mirror on my closet door. I was dying to see what
I’d look like.

I’ll slip it on for just a second, I decided. Long enough to see how ugly and
frightening I’d look.

Holding it in both hands, I raised the mask over my head.

Then slowly, carefully… very carefully… I began to pull the mask
down, down, down over my face.

“Steve—!”

Mom’s loud cry from downstairs startled me.

“Steve—where are you? Get down here for your dinner!”

“Coming!” I shouted back. I lowered the mask. I’d try it on later, I decided.

I walked quickly to the dresser and pulled open my sock drawer. Smoothing the
long, spidery hair over the ugly face, I set the mask down carefully in the
drawer. Then I hid it under several pairs of socks and closed the drawer.

I hurried down to the kitchen. Mom had a salad on the table and a plate of
warmed-up macaroni-and-cheese.

My stomach growled. I suddenly realized that I was starved! I sat down,
pushed the salad aside, and started forking up the macaroni as fast as I could.

I glanced down to see Sparky staring up at me with his big, black, soulful eyes. He saw me looking at him and tilted his
head.

“Sparky,” I said, “you don’t like macaroni—remember?”

He tilted his head the other way, as if trying to understand. I slipped him a
couple of noodles. He sniffed them and left them on the floor.

Behind me, Mom busily cleaned out the refrigerator, making room for the
groceries Dad was out buying. I was
dying
to tell her about the scary
mask. I wanted to show it to her. Maybe put it on and make her scream.

But I knew she’d ask too many questions about where I bought it, and how much
it cost, and how much of my allowance I used up to pay for it.

All questions I couldn’t answer.

So I bit my tongue and forced myself not to blurt out the exciting news that
I wouldn’t have to be a hobo again this Halloween.

That was my costume for the past five years. A hobo. Actually, it wasn’t much
of a costume. I wore one of Dad’s baggy old suits with patches on the pants. Mom
rubbed charcoal on my face to make me look dirty. And I carried a knapsack on a
fishing pole over my shoulder.

Bor-ring!

This Halloween will be different, I promised myself. This Halloween will not
be boring.

I was so happy. As I sat gobbling down macaroni-and-cheese, I couldn’t get that creepy mask out of my mind.

I’m not going to tell
anyone
about it, I decided. I’m going to scare
everyone I know.

I’m not even going to tell Chuck. After all, he ran away and left me down in
that dark basement.

Look out, Chuckie Boy! I told myself, grinning so hard some noodles slipped
out of my mouth. I’m going to get you too!

I had soccer practice for my first graders after school the next day. It was
a sunny, cold October afternoon. The sunlight made the yellow and brown falling
leaves glitter like gold. Puffs of white cloud floated like soft cotton across
the blue sky.

Everything looked beautiful to me. Because Halloween was only one day away.

I was staring up at the clouds when Marnie Rosen drop-kicked the soccer ball
into my stomach.

I grabbed my stomach and doubled over in pain. Duck Benton and two other kids
jumped on my back and drove me facedown into the mud.

I didn’t care.

In fact, I laughed.

Because I knew that I had only one day to wait.

I tried to show them how to pass. As I ran along the sidelines, Andrew Foster
stuck out his foot. I tripped and went sailing into the bike rack. A handlebar caught me under the chin as I fell, and I actually saw stars.

But I didn’t care.

I picked myself up with a grin on my face.

Because I knew a secret. I knew an evil secret that the kids didn’t know. I
knew that trick-or-treat night was going to be a
special
treat for me!

At four o’clock, I called an end to practice. I was too weak to blow the
whistle. My clothes were soaked with mud, I walked with a limp, and I had cuts
and bruises in twenty different places.

A typical practice with the Horrible Hogs.

But did I care?

You know the answer.

I gathered them in a circle around me. They were shoving each other, and
pulling hair, and calling each other horrible names. I told you—they’re total
animals.

I raised my hands to quiet them down. “Let’s have a special Hogs’ Halloween
party tomorrow,” I suggested.

“YAAAY!” they cheered.

“We’ll meet in our costumes after practice,” I continued. “The whole team.
And we’ll all go trick-or-treating together. I’ll take you.”

“YAAY!” they cheered again.

“So tell your parents to drop you off,” I told them. “This is going to be our
special party. We’ll meet in front of the old Carpenter mansion.”

Silence. This time they didn’t cheer.

“Why do we have to meet there?” Andrew asked.

“Isn’t that old house supposed to be haunted?” Marnie asked softly.

“That place is too creepy,” Duck added.

I narrowed my eyes at them, challenging them. “You guys aren’t
scared
—are you?” I demanded.

Silence. They exchanged nervous glances.

“Well? Are you all too wimpy to meet me there?” I asked.

“No way!” Marnie insisted.

“No way! We’re not scared of a stupid old house!”

They all began to tell me how brave they were. They all said they would meet
me there.

“I saw a ghost once,” Johnny Myers bragged. “Behind my garage. I shouted
‘Boo!’ and it floated away.”

These kids are animals, but they have great imaginations.

The other kids all started teasing Johnny. He stuck to his story. He insisted
he saw a ghost. So they pushed him to the ground and got his jacket all muddy.

“Hey, Steve—what are you going to be for Halloween?” Marnie asked.

“Yeah. What’s your costume?” Andrew demanded.

“He’s going to be a pile of toxic waste!” someone joked.

“No. He’s going to be a ballerina!” someone else declared.

They all hooted and jeered.

Go ahead and laugh, guys, I thought. Have a good laugh now. Because when you
see me on Halloween, I’ll be the only one laughing.

“Uh… I’m going to be a hobo,” I told them. “You’ll recognize me. I’ll be
wearing a tattered old suit. And my face will be all dirty. I’ll be dressed like
a bum.”

“You
are
a bum!” one of my loyal team members shouted.

More wild laughing and hooting. More shoving and hair-pulling and wrestling
on the ground.

Luckily, their parents and baby-sitters showed up to take them home. I
watched them go with a big smile on my face. A big, evil smile.

Then I grabbed up my backpack and hurried home. I ran all the way. I was
eager to take another look at my mask.

Chuck stepped out as I jogged past his house. “Hey, Steve… what’s up?”
he called.

“Not much!” I called back. “Later, man!”

I kept running. I didn’t want to hang out with Chuck. I needed to check out
that mask. I needed to remind myself of how awesome it was. How totally
terrifying.

I burst through the front door. Then I ran straight up the stairs to my room,
taking the stairs three at a time.

I raced down the long hall. I turned into my room and tossed my backpack onto
the bed. Then I hurried across the room to my dresser and eagerly jerked open my
sock drawer.

“Huh?”

I peered inside. With a trembling hand, I shoved away several balled-up pairs
of socks.

The mask was gone.

“No!”

I began pawing frantically through the drawer, tossing all the socks onto the
floor.

No mask. Gone.

The balled-up socks bounced all over the room. My heart was bouncing too.

Then I remembered that I had moved the mask. Before school that morning. I
was worried that my mom might do laundry. And open my sock drawer. And see it
there.

So I had shoved it to the back of my closet, behind my rolled-up sleeping
bag.

Letting out a long whoosh of air, I dropped to my hands and knees. I quickly
collected all the socks and stuffed them back into the drawer. Then I opened the
closet door and pulled down the mask from the top shelf.

Steve, you’ve got to calm down, man, I told myself. It’s just a Halloween
mask, after all. You’ve got to stop scaring yourself like that.

Sometimes it helps to scold yourself, to give yourself advice.

I started to feel a little calmer. I smoothed back the stringy yellow hair
and rubbed my hand over the craggy, scab-covered skin of the mask.

The brown lips sneered at me. I poked my little finger through the disgusting
wormhole in the tooth. I squeezed the spiders hiding inside the ears.

“This is
so cool!”
I declared out loud.

I couldn’t wait a whole day till Halloween. I had to show it to someone.

No. I had to
scare
someone with it.

Chuck’s face popped instantly into my mind. My old friend Chuck was the
perfect victim. I knew that he was home. I had seen him there a few minutes ago.