4

Valley Ridge is a small town. Not one of those small towns with one hundred kids per school, but a small town that has less than two hundred people in the entire population. It's one of those towns with not even forty families. All, well most, of the families are the textbook mom, dad, and two kids.

Everybody knows the whereabouts of everybody else. Like when Tommy Strider crashed his bike into the river, word was all over before he even got back to town.

      Things don't change much. You're born in Valley Ridge; you stay in Valley Ridge. The last wedding, a few months ago, was between Lin Cunnings and Berry Strauss. Everybody went, that's the way things are. When you've got so few people in town you invite everybody just so there's enough people to make a party. When Belle Monroe and Jacob Howard split, Belle didn't even move out of town, she just took her daughter and moved to one of the houses recently vacated by older folk. I still remember the day Callum Wesley, his brother, and his parents moved because Callum got bullied too much. No one liked the Wesley's much, anyway. But, still, moving out of town is unheard of. And, it isn’t like we didn't know why; our school even had an anti-bullying assembly because of it.

      Dating here isn't like it is in other places. You get into a relationship it's pretty much set that you plan to get married. Dating is no little pass time. With a town as small as ours, you can't just hop around. You choose a guy and you marry him; that's the way it's always been. You get hitched, move into one of the houses the old people move out of and settle down.

      Sometimes knowing everybody else's business is a problem. Like, after Betty Jane (sterile since she was a teenager) got married to Fred Elsoe, it wasn't a mystery why she made the long trip to Williamsburg. She was going to adopt two kids. Her kids are the sweetest things really; I baby-sat for Emory and Linden a few times.

      All my life I've lived in Valley Ridge, Virginia, and the small town atmosphere was my favorite thing about the quaint little town. I'd never expected anything to be different; I never wanted to leave. But, that was before.

      I haven't heard anything about the other families, besides the Delmontes, in months. It worried me. The unfamiliarity was something our town had never had to deal with. I don't even know who's dead and who's alive, which families got up and left at the first sign of trouble, and how everybody is even doing.

      It petrified me. I don't know my own town. To me, that’s scarier than the beast outside.

      For some reason, I wake up thinking about this. My parents are up and talking and Mac is awake, but still letting me sleep on his shoulder.

      "Morning, Cor," Mac greets me. "Yesterday wiped you out, huh?"

      "I'll say," I reply yawning. My family spent the whole day with the Delmontes, we had them over to our place for lunch, and then for dinner, we ate at the Delmontes but used food from both of our families' food supplies. Gradually things got less awkward to the point of, at dinner, it almost being the way things were before. We stayed up talking until way into the night, when my parents finally said that it'd be best for us to head home.

      "It's nice knowing that other people are alive besides us," Mac says. I nod. Sometimes, I swear he can read my mind.

      “You wanna come with me to go make breakfast?" I ask. Mac would come even if I didn't ask him, but I ask anyway because it’s courtesy.

      "Or, how about you make the breakfast and I watch you while you're making it?" Mac suggests. I smile.

      "Nice try," I say as I stand up. I head up the stairs to make breakfast with Mac right next to me.

 

      Later in the day, I take some time to relax in my bedroom. Normally being upstairs would be alarming, but Mom is downstairs preparing dinner. I can hear the chop, chop, chop of her knife cutting whatever it was it was cutting. Mac is next door using his computer or reading or listening to music, or something along those lines.

      I’m curled up in the corner of my room with the book Life as We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer. I've read the book 100 times over and it's no doubt my favorite. It's basically about a world where the moon is knocked closer to earth by a meteor. Of course, it's not real, things like that can't happen in real life. But, it helps me to cope, the problems the people in the book face are much worse than my own.

      My family and I have it lucky, I think. We have ample food supply, our dad's the sheriff, and our house is connected to another family's. Not many of the remaining families in Valley Ridge have that. Lucky is a term that should be used subjectively, however.

      After a few more minutes of reading, I decide to go downstairs to help my mother with dinner. I’m about to leave when I hear someone call me.

      "Quorraline," the voice whispers. Well actually, it's more a like hiss. It’s definitely not my Mom or my dad. And, Mac wouldn't scare me like this.

      "Quorraline," it hisses again. Moving very slowly, I put my book down on my bean bag and look around my room. No one is in it besides me. My closet is wide open, and I find myself unable to pull my gaze away from the unmoving clothes.

      Is there someone, or something, inside of my closet?

      I swallow.

      "Quorraline."

      I slowly stand up, and back out of the room. My first instinct is to tell my brother, but I don't need him to tell me what I already know, that I'm paranoid. I make my way down stairs, my mother is stirring now instead of chopping. Clearly she hadn't heard anything anomalous, or else she wouldn't be calmly standing there.

      Maybe whoever was calling me was calling in a way so that only I could hear, but then it'd have to be in my room. But it couldn't have been in my room, because how would it even get up there.

      "Quorraline."

      I nearly fall over, when it hisses again, but something draws me to the window. I pull it aside and see a silhouette at the edge of the forest beckoning to me.

      "Quorraline." It hisses again.

      My body moves without me controlling it. It makes me open the front door and dash out in the direction of the silhouette.

      "Quorraline."

      I regain control of my body and I pull myself to a stop in the outskirts of the forest.

      Panting I look around and the full realization of what I'd done smacks me in the face. No one who ventures out at night comes back.

      I'm paralyzed by fear as I stand by myself in the middle of the woods at night.

      "Quorraline."

      I look around to locate the source of the sound but I can't see anything.

      "Quorraline."

      Something jumps out from the trees, landing in front of me. I stumble backwards, my ankle twisting beneath me as I trip over a stick. The pain is not what I'm worrying about, however.

      The creature that stands before me would be cadaverous, pale and gaunt, if it were a human. But, this was definitely not a human. Long fangs filled its mouth and razor sharp claws tipped its fingers. Its skin was barely clinging to the bone and it was a pale white. A shredded black gown hung from its form. Long pale black hair comes from its scalp.

      "Quorraline." This was what was saying my name.

      It pounced on me until it was barely a breath's distance from my face. The creature is those who venture out at night's last sight.

      It lifts a hand up and brings it to my cheek. I expect it to cut me in some way but it doesn't.

      "Quorraline, I no kill you," It hisses.

      It pulls its hand away and its head shoots up.

      "Go," it hisses without turning back to me. When I don't move it looks back at me. "GO."

      I jump to my feet and run for my life without looking back. I don't stop until I trip on air and land on the concrete driveway of my house, sobbing breathlessly.

      I could've died, but it didn't kill me. Why didn't it kill me?

      "Quorraline?!" My father says from the doorway. I cry harder hearing his voice.

      "She's alive," my father says as he kneels down next to me. He pulls me to his chest.

      "Quorraline, what happened?" I can't answer him, especially when I realize I'm not the only one crying.

      I'm alive, I should be dead. Why aren't I dead? With that question, blackness clouds the edge of my vision.

      "You're okay, it's all right," my father whispers. It's most definitely not alright.

      I met with the creature face to face, and it was scarier than I could ever imagine. Yet, I am not dead. I'm supposed to be dead.

      The world fades to black, and I pass out.