Wrong Number 2 (5 page)

“But it's obviously someone who's really sick,” Chuck continued. “Someone who could be dangerous.”

Deena felt a little shiver. I should tell Mom and Dad, she thought.

“If you were in California,” Chuck told Jade, “you'd be safe from whoever this nut is.”

“Chuck, I really don't think—” Jade started to say.
But her words were cut off by the chime of the doorbell. She jumped up and hurried to answer it.

A moment later Jade returned to the living room, holding a stack of envelopes. “Just the mailman,” she told them. She began flipping through the envelopes—and abruptly stopped.

She pulled out a long white envelope and tore it open. After removing a folded piece of paper, she smoothed it to read it.

A moment later Jade dropped it with a shriek.

“J
ade, what is it?” Deena cried, running to her.

Jade didn't answer. She stared down in horror at the piece of paper, which had fallen onto the coffee table.

As Chuck stepped up behind her, Deena picked up the paper. She studied it—and felt another chill go down her back.

It wasn't a letter. The sheet of typing paper had a drawing pasted on it.

A drawing of a chain saw.

Someone had splattered a red marker on the page to make it look as if blood dripped from the saw. The bright drops of blood led to stark black letters at the bottom of the page: YOUR TURN NEXT.

“I don't believe it!” Jade cried. “This is so gross!”

“Someone is a real sicko,” Chuck said softly.

“Well, at least now we know one thing for sure,” Deena said, turning her eyes away from the ugly drawing.

“What do we know?” Jade asked.

“We know it couldn't possibly be Farberson,” Deena declared. “They censor prison mail—right? The prison would never have let Farberson send this.”

“Hey—you're right!” Jade cried. “But, then, who?”

“What if Farberson got out somehow?” Chuck suggested, staring at the chain saw.

Deena swallowed hard. “Th-they wouldn't let him out. He's a murderer,” she said softly.

“There's one way to find out,” Chuck told her. “Let's drive over to Fear Street to see if anyone is living in Farberson's house.”

“Have you totally lost it?” Jade asked him. “The last time we went to Farberson's house, we nearly got killed!”

“We won't get out of the car,” Chuck assured her. “We'll just drive past. Check it out. Then drive away as fast as we can. It'll be perfectly safe.”

“There won't be anything to see,” objected Deena. “I mean, Farberson's house has been deserted since he went to prison. Dad told me so.”

“Then there isn't anything to be afraid of,” Chuck declared. He stood up. “Come on. Put on your coats. Let's go.”

• • •

When they first turned onto Fear Street, it seemed like any other street in Shadyside. But as they drove past Simon Fear's burned-out mansion and the Fear Street cemetery with its ancient tombstones poking up from the ground like skeleton arms, it became easy to see why so many frightening stories were told about the street.

Farberson's house stood on a big lot next to the cemetery.

Deena pulled her mom's Civic up to the crumbling front curb. The fading sunlight made the two-story Victorian house look even creepier than she had remembered it.

“What a wreck!” Deena declared. She could quickly see that nobody had lived in the house for a year. In fact, the house was so run-down, it was as if no one had
ever
lived there!

Several of the windows were boarded up. Others were cracked. The shutters hung loose on their hinges. And the scraggly lawn was overrun with brown weeds poking up through the patches of icy snow.

“Yeah. The house is definitely deserted,” Jade murmured.

“Who'd want to move here?” Deena replied. “I mean, after everything that happened?”

“It really looks like a haunted house!” Chuck declared, staring at it. “Think there are ghosts?”

Deena gazed up at the house. “Oh!” She let out a startled cry as a light flickered on in an upstairs window.

A ghostly, flickering light.

“S-someone's in there!” Deena stammered. She stared at the light as if she had been hypnotized.

“Who could it be?” Jade whispered.

“The gas man?” cracked Chuck.

“Chuck, don't be a jerk!” Jade cried. “There's someone in that house. Let's get going! Now!”

“It's just the sun reflecting off the window,” Chuck insisted.

“Chuck, the sun is practically down,” Deena said. “Let's go!”

She knew that Chuck was just trying to frighten them. It didn't take much to frighten Jade or her in this neighborhood—not after what had happened to them in this house.

“I think we should check it out,” Chuck said, reaching for the door handle.

“Chuck!” Jade cried.

“It's probably just some homeless person who's moved in,” Chuck said, ignoring Jade's panic.

“Chuck—you promised,” Jade said shrilly. “You promised we wouldn't stay. You said—”

But he pushed open the car door and slid out. “Back in a second.”

Deena and Jade called to him to come back. But Chuck started jogging across the front yard, up to the front porch.

“I don't
believe
him!” Deena cried. “He's crazy. He's just
crazy!
He promised—”

“Deena—look!” Jade shrieked. She pointed to the house.

Deena raised her eyes to the upstairs window. To her surprise, the pale light had moved.

The house lay in darkness. Then, as she stared up at the house, she saw the light flicker in a downstairs window.

“Whoever has the light—came downstairs!” Jade whispered.

“We've got to warn Chuck!” Deena cried.

Where
was
Chuck?

Deena squinted into the hazy twilight. “Oh, no!” she shouted.

Chuck had climbed onto the front porch. Did he plan to go in?

Deena and Jade shoved open their car doors and screamed a desperate warning. “Chuck! Chuck! Don't go in!”

“O
h, no!” Jade shrieked. “He's going in! I've got to get him!”

“Jade, no—!” Deena pleaded. But her friend had already climbed out of the car and was running up the lawn toward the porch. She slipped once on a patch of icy snow, but kept on going, calling Chuck's name.

Chuck turned around and said something Deena couldn't hear.

Jade pointed upstairs and said something back. They seemed to be arguing.

Hurry up, you two, Deena urged silently. We've got to get out of here!

And then she saw something else, something Chuck and Jade couldn't see.

Another light.

A light flickering from
behind
the house.

And then Deena heard the grind and cough of an engine starting up.

She turned her head and searched the empty street.

No. The sound didn't come from the street.

It came from behind the house.

“Jade! Chuck!” she yelled. “Someone's coming!”

Jade and Chuck stopped arguing and turned toward the street. They must have heard the engine too, Deena realized.

She saw Chuck leap off the porch and start toward the back of the house. Jade grabbed his hand and began pulling him in the opposite direction.

“Come back! Hurry!” Deena shouted frantically. Her heart pounding, she dived back into the car. After sliding behind the wheel, she turned the key and revved the engine.

Deena stared out at Jade and Chuck. Jade won the argument, Deena decided. She watched the two of them jog to the car.

The engine behind the house roared louder.

Jade and Chuck were halfway across the yard, when Jade slipped again. This time she fell into the snow.

Chuck bent over her.

“My ankle, my ankle!” Deena heard Jade cry.

“Hurry!
Please!
Hurry!” Deena screamed.

The light behind the house had faded. The yard was bathed in a blue-gray darkness now.

Deena watched Chuck tenderly put his arm around
Jade's waist. She seemed to be having trouble getting to her feet in the snow.

Hurry, hurry, hurry. Deena repeated her silent plea.

The engine roar faded. Changed. No longer the sound of an engine revving up.

Now it became the steady hum of a moving car—a car rolling down the driveway.

“Chuck! Jade!” Deena's voice came out choked and frightened.

Chuck still had his arm around Jade's waist. Jade took a hobbling step—and then froze, staring at the side of the house.

As Deena squinted into the darkness, a car came bouncing out from behind the house.

Its headlights had been off, Deena realized.

It wheeled off the driveway. Onto the front lawn.

Picking up speed.

Faster. Faster.

Straight at Chuck and Jade.

D
eena called frantically to her friends. But they were frozen in place.

The car picked up speed as it roared across the snow-patched lawn.

The driver is trying to run them down! Deena realized. “Run! Come on—run!” she shrieked.

Finally Jade and Chuck started to move. They lurched toward the street, Jade stumbling and sliding as Chuck tried to help her.

Deena leaned over and popped open the passenger door. The dark car moved closer, bouncing the whole way.

Jade dove into the backseat. Chuck slid in beside
Deena, breathing hard. “Go! Go! Go!” he screamed breathlessly.

The car doors still open, Deena floored the gas pedal. The car jerked away from the curb, tires squealing.

In the rearview mirror Deena saw the other car bounce off the curb, spin into the street.

It tried to ram right into us! she realized.

“Go! Go! Go!” Chuck repeated. He twisted in the seat to peer out the back window. “It—it's chasing us!”

Deena saw the headlights flash on. White light swept into the car.

“Go! Go! Go!”

“I can't go any faster!” Deena shrieked, and roared through a stop sign. The tires skidded over an icy patch. The car jolted forward, slid, then shot ahead.

“It—it's catching up!” Jade wailed from the backseat. “What are we going to do?”

Deena couldn't answer. She was concentrating too hard to think. The dark trees and front yards of Fear Street whirred past as if in a dream. The only light came from the bouncing headlights of the car chasing them.

Deena reached Old Mill Road, flew around the corner without looking, wrestling the car to stay on the road. The tires squealed in protest. A horn blared. Brakes screeched.

Faster. Down the dark, empty street.

The other car turned too. The invading light swept through the car.

“It—it's right behind us!” Jade uttered in a tight, frightened voice. “It—”