The Nightmarys (7 page)

already reached the top of the steps.

“Yeah?”

“She hasn’t returned any of my messages

lately. Is everything okay with her? How’s

Ben?”

She’d hit the nail on the head.

“I’ve got a run, Mrs. Chen,” he said. “Thanks

for the ride!”

“O-Okay then,” she said quietly. “See you

boys after practice.”

As Timothy entered the locker room, he

realized he didn’t want to be there. After

everything that had happened that day, al he

real y wanted to do was curl up in bed and

real y wanted to do was curl up in bed and

continue reading The Clue of the Incomplete

Corpse. He was determined to nd his own

clue regarding the names writ en on pages 102,

149, and 203. Maybe the answer was in the

story.

The locker room’s dim lighting, high ceilings,

and dark stone wal s created a unique cryptlike

atmosphere deep inside the building. Timothy

found a spot in the farthest corner away from

the showers, hidden at the end of the longest

row of lockers. From his bag, he lifted away the

mysterious book and careful y placed it onto

the bench beside him.

“Let’s hustle, July,” cal ed Coach Thom from

the far end of the row. Clapping his hands and

moving on, he shouted, “Water’s waiting, Chen.

Move it.”

Timothy’s face burned. So much for hiding

out now. He ung his bag into the nearest

locker. He quickly changed into his bathing

suit, before grabbing the book from the bench.

Zelda Kite’s worried eyes glanced over

Zelda Kite’s worried eyes glanced over

Timothy’s shoulder, as if she knew that

someone had crept up behind him.

Spinning around, Timothy was met with a

smile by Stuart, standing inches away. Timothy

nearly jumped but managed to control himself.

“What do you want?” he said.

“Scare you?” said Stuart. “Sorry.”

“You didn’t scare me,” said Timothy. “I just

didn’t expect you there.”

“Right.” Stuart brie y looked at the book in

Timothy’s hands. “Pret y funny what happened

today, don’t you think?”

Timothy shoved the book into his locker,

snatched his towel o the oor, and wrapped it

around his shoulders. “What was funny?”

“What happened to your partner,” said

Stuart. “The water bal oon?”

“How do you know it was a water bal oon?”

said Timothy, playing the game.

Stuart smiled. “Whatever, dude. We al

thought it was pret y funny.”

thought it was pret y funny.”

“Wel , I didn’t. I got pret y soaked.”

“Whose fault was that?”

Timothy shook his head. “Are you saying I

threw the water bal oon at myself?”

“No. I’m saying you were too close. You

stand next to the target, you get wet.”

“Stuart …” Timothy’ face turned red. “You’re

such a … a fart-slap.”

“A fart-slap?” said Stuart, laughing. “What the

heck is a fart-slap?”

Timothy stared at the oor, thinking of

Abigail’s cleverness. “It’s not good,” he

answered, then climbed over the bench and

brushed past Stuart, heading for the showers.

12.

The water was cold. Swimming freestyle,

Timothy stared at the ceramic tiles drifting

away into the hazy deep end. When he reached

the wal underneath the diving platforms, he

noticed that Coach Thom was speaking with

Stuart, two lanes over and a pool length away.

Stuart sat on the water’s edge in the shal ow

end. Their voices echoed throughout the large

room.

“Where was it?” said Thom.

Stuart shook his head, closed his eyes, then

pointed at the deep end. Thom peered into the

water. “I’ve got a clear view of the entire

bot om of the pool, Chen. I can assure you, I

don’t see any monsters. You want to get back in

the water now?”

Monsters? Timothy chuckled before he

ducked back under and pushed o the wal .

What a freak! He’d heard a ton of excuses for

What a freak! He’d heard a ton of excuses for

wanting to sit out a lap or two, but that was the

craziest in a very long time.

The weird thing, though, was that Stuart had

looked truly scared. Timothy swept the bot om

of the pool with his eyes, trying to make out

exactly what Stuart could have mistaken for a

monster. But there was nothing down there

except for a couple of glimmering pieces of

loose change, far away near the drain at the

bot om of the twenty- ve-foot wel . Seconds

later, he’d made it to the wal in the shal ow

end to nd Stuart stil sit ing in the gut er, his

feet pul ed up out of the water.

Now Thom sounded real y angry. “You can

get in or go home, Chen. I’m not going to say it

again. Let’s move!”

Reluctantly, Stuart slid into the water. He

glanced at Timothy brie y before popping his

goggles over his eyes. He ducked under the lane

lines and entered Timothy’s lane. Timothy was

about to push o the wal , when he felt Stuart

grab his arm.

grab his arm.

“What is it?” said Timothy.

Stuart’s eyes were invisible behind his

mirrored lenses. “It was the thing with the

claw,” he said in a low voice.

“What was the thing with the claw?”

“The monster from Wraith Wars?” said Stuart,

sounding freaked out. “The game? It was at the

bot om of the pool.”

Timothy didn’t even know how to respond.

Hadn’t they just been ghting? Obviously,

Stuart was terri ed. Timothy remembered how

crazy he had felt in the basement of the

museum that morning, when al the golden

idols had stared at him.

“I didn’t see anything down there,” said

Timothy. “Maybe your goggles were smudged.”

Stuart nodded. “I’m gonna fol ow behind you,

though, okay? In this lane.”

Timothy sighed. “Okay.”

When he nal y pushed o the wal , he

realized that, in a way, they’d both just

realized that, in a way, they’d both just

apologized to each other.

Twenty laps later, Timothy hopped out of the

pool to take a drink from the water fountain.

He was out of breath and his brain was racing

with numbers. Five hundred yards, twenty laps,

twenty minutes on the clock …

Then, pages 102, 149, and 203.

And eventual y names: Carlton Quigley.

Bucky Jenkins. Leroy “Two Fingers” Fromm …

Zelda Kite. Zilpha Kindred. Abigail Tremens.

Timothy had just come up from the fountain,

when he noticed someone standing in the last

row of bleachers. Since the lights hung low in a

similar fashion to the locker room, the steep

seats were dark. The pool itself was bright.

Timothy held his hand up to shade the light.

What he saw sent goose bumps rippling

across his skin. Timothy could see only a

silhouet e—the man in the long overcoat and

the brimmed hat. He understood clearly why

the brimmed hat. He understood clearly why

the man had come.

The book.

It was stil in his locker.

The man descended the stadium stairs and

slipped into the nearest exit, disappearing

entirely into the shadows of the upstairs

hal way.

Timothy turned and dashed toward the boys’

lockers. Slipping and sliding on the cold

ceramic tile, he heard Thom shout, “No

running!” before careening through the

doorway. He ignored his coach, fearing that, in

his rush to get away from Stuart, he might have

forgot en to put the padlock on his locker.

In the hal way, Timothy slowed. He suddenly

felt foolish. Was he real y wil ing to risk his life

just to keep a stupid old kids’ book?

He skidded to a halt. The hal way didn’t look

the same. It was longer than usual. Where had

the showers gone?

Timothy turned around. The hal way behind

Timothy turned around. The hal way behind

him stretched on for what looked like hundreds

of yards before disappearing into murky

darkness.

Had he taken the wrong hal way? Maybe he

was accidental y heading toward the girls’

room? Something deep inside told him, No. He

hadn’t made a wrong turn—the hal way had.

Timothy decided to return to the pool,

toward the safety of his team, but as he ran, the

hal way continued to grow even longer. The

ceiling sank lower. The wal s were covered

with grime. The oor was slick with gray-green

slime. Mildew. Or something. And it stank, like

old cheese.

He stopped again. The pool entrance should

have been directly in front of him. But al

Timothy could see in both directions was the

hal way, which was growing darker by the

second. There were no pool sounds. No

shouting, no splashing. He could almost hear

the mold growing in the wal ’s crevices. The

sound of his heart was pounding in his ears.

sound of his heart was pounding in his ears.

Timothy squeezed his eyes shut for a brief

second and violently shook his head. Snap out

of it, he told himself. When he opened his eyes

again, he caught a glimpse of light at the end of

the hal way behind him. Stainless steel. The

showers! Timothy bolted. At least now, he

knew where he was going.

He burst through the doorway into the

shower room’s yel ow light. Beyond the

showerheads was the cavernous locker room.

He bounded to the last row of lockers. But

when he peered around the rusted aluminum

edge, the row was about half as long as usual.

A T-shaped path veered where an L usual y

bent. Maybe he was remembering it wrong?

Without thinking, Timothy dashed forward,

but when he reached the T, he knew for certain

that the problem wasn’t his memory.

His locker was not there.

Timothy glanced in both directions. The

shadows were encroaching from the ceiling

again, the low-hanging globes inching closer to

again, the low-hanging globes inching closer to

the ground. How was that possible?

Though his mind raced, Timothy walked

slowly, lightly, back toward the showers. His

feet were cold, and his skin was prickly. He

made his way to the end of the row and

peeked around the corner, but the showers

were no longer there. Instead, the sight of a

dirty brick wal greeted him, like a slap in the

face.

“No,” Timothy groaned. He leaned against

the locker at the end of the row. The coldness

of the metal bit into his shoulder, and he leapt

away from it, holding in a shriek.

A locker slammed. He jumped. He couldn’t

tel where the noise had come from.

Someone was with him, somewhere in this

big room.

Timothy shivered. Then he ran. He wasn’t

sure where he was going. The more he ran, the

more he realized he was not merely lost—the

room didn’t look familiar at al anymore. These

lockers were bashed and bat ered, the doors

lockers were bashed and bat ered, the doors

hanging o their hinges. Some of them had

been painted black; gra ti was scratched into

their metal surfaces—words much worse than

the one he’d cal ed Stuart earlier—strange,

almost alien symbols, horri c faces with slitlike

feline eyes and gaping needle- l ed mouths.

Timothy tried not to think that anything could

be hiding just inside these doors—Stuart’s

clawed monster, the Aztec idols, the cloudy

creatures in the specimen jars. Things with

black watchful eyes. The more Timothy ran, the

more he realized that if he stopped, he’d regret

it.He came around a corner and screamed.

A man stood at the end of the corridor, his

hand reaching into the nearest open locker. He

turned to look at Timothy. The shadow from

the brim of his hat obscured his face. His long

gray overcoat hung almost al the way to the

oor, barely covering his black wingtips. For a

second, Timothy had the feeling he was staring

at a ghost. Then the man withdrew from the

at a ghost. Then the man withdrew from the

locker. In his hand was the book; he used it to

slam the locker shut.

Timothy was frozen with fear. He wanted to

shout, Put it down! But the book didn’t even

belong to him. If anything, the man was simply

stealing it back.

“You shouldn’t take things that don’t belong