Chapter One

We moved just a few months after Mom died. I think Dad was tired of seeing the house without her or something. I didn’t blame him, I felt the same way. So we went out looking for someplace where we could start again.

Creek View was that kind of place. Tucked away in the middle of nowhere, we found a cheap two-bedroom house for rent and moved in on a rainy Saturday afternoon. I looked over my shoulder a few times to see curtains flutter in the windows across the street. There was an unmistakable feeling that we were being watched. Dad didn’t say anything about it, but he looked up every now and then, so I knew he felt it.

I took the small room. It was about the size of a large walk-in closet, which was just big enough for me to get my bed, bookshelf and dresser drawer inside. There was one window that looked out to the street and no ceiling light. I unpacked my things and spent about an hour vainly rearranging furniture in hopes that it would somehow make my room seem bigger, or at least less cramped.

I put my radio on top of the dresser, plugged it in and flopped down onto my bed. I shifted around to get comfortable but couldn’t seem to manage it. My mattress felt different here. Like the way pizza tastes different if you eat it with a fork and knife.

Dad came past my room, carrying a large box of his own stuff. “Genie, can’t you help?” he grunted.

I peeled myself from my bed and started unpacking the boxes downstairs, only because I didn’t want to go back out into the rain to get the boxes still from the rented U-Haul trailer. I arranged the furniture nicely as possible, so the light from the window would never hit the TV screen and make a glare and so the bookshelves neatly framed the doorways and windows. I set the picture frames neatly beside the books and on the end tables. I set up lamps and unrolled the rug and hung up a photo on a nail that was already in the wall. There weren’t any curtains or anything yet but there were some hooks already in the walls so it would be easy to set them up.

By the time I was done with the living room, Dad had set up the dining room and brought in all the boxes. We didn’t have any food so the choice was to go out for dinner or get groceries and make a home-cooked meal for the first time in two days. As appealing as that sounded, we were both way too tired for that. So we got back in the car and went to a relatively cozy looking diner called Millie’s and sat in a booth by the door.

Some of the other customers stared at us, most likely because in a town this size, newcomers were painfully obvious. I did my best to ignore them. Dad didn’t seem to notice them at all.

The twenty-something waitress who took our order was pregnant and reeked of cigarettes. “You guys aren’t from around here, are you?” she said in a husky voice that sounded like it had been drowned in bourbon.

“Just moved here,” Dad smiled politely.

“You were the ones with the U-Haul.”

“Oh…do you live by us?”

“No, I just heard it from Deb in the kitchen. She heard it from Stacey who heard from Mike who lives across the street from you.”

Dad stared. “Pretty big news, huh?”

She made a face like she thought she was being mocked and didn’t appreciate it. “Y’want something to eat or what?”

“I’ll have a burger,” I said quickly. “Uh, well done.”

“I’ll get the fish sandwich,” Dad said.

“Geez, what’s her issue?” I muttered.

Dad either ignored me or didn’t’ hear me.

I had a hard time sleeping that night because every time I turned out the light I was convinced that the creaking floorboard noises and clunking pipes were monsters or ghosts or something. I would turn out the light, freak out, turn the light back on until I was calm, turn it off, freak out, turn on the light and repeat for hours. Eventually I just fell asleep with the light on.

My alarm clock woke me up bright and early for the first day of school. Well, it was my first day anyways. I hadn’t missed much, only just the first month, but I hated coming in late.

I walked to school slowly, trying to memorize my surroundings. It was October so there were some houses already stringing up orange and black streamers or putting pumpkins on their doorsteps.

Some of the kids in school noticed me and stared warily but others just passed me by. Did I stick out that much? Was it that obvious that I wasn’t from around here? Were their lives so painfully boring that I really made that much of an impact just by walking around in their school?

I picked up my schedule from the office and went to my first class: biology. The teacher told me to sit in the back table next to this scrawny, long-faced redhead she called “Atticus.” At first I wasn’t sure I heard her right, because it was such a weird name to exist outside of a book, but later I saw him fill out his name on the top of a worksheet and it said “Atticus Germaine” very clearly. What kind of moron parent gives their kid a name like that?

He didn’t seem to notice me at all, just kept staring off into space or down at his blank notebook for the entire class. Sometimes his eyes would snap up and focus on something that wasn’t there. It was…bizarre.

After class, a beautiful blonde girl who had sat in front of me approached me in the hall and said, “Don’t be too weirded out by Atticus.”

“What?”

“He’s crazy, definitely, but he’s harmless. He works in a morgue, so I guess that explains a lot, you know? How do you like Creek View so far?”

I shrugged, trying to ignore what she said about Atticus. “I dunno, it’s alright.”

“You should try out for a sports team or something, it’s a great way to meet people.”

I grinned apologetically. “I’m not athletic at all.”

“Doesn’t matter, we’re not that competitive. My name’s April, by the way. You might see my sister around…we’re twins, so try to keep us straight.” She smiled sweetly. “Anyways, I gotta go to class. See you around!”

I waved, baffled. Such a friendly interaction seemed out of place next to all the weird stares I was getting.

Lunch was a nightmare. I sat by myself and some chunky older girl with bleach-blonde hair, an awful spray-on tan, tight clothes and too much eye makeup kept looking back from her table to mine. Eventually she whispered something to one of her friends and the both of them looked back at me with malicious grins. I rolled my eyes. These people probably didn’t even know there was a world outside of Creek View, why should I be bothered by their small-town opinions?

When they got up to leave, Chunky Blonde purred sweetly, “Nice outfit, creep.”

I ignored them and when they’d left I looked down at myself. I didn’t think I looked so bad. Maybe my clothes were a little shabby, but it wasn’t like I’d crawled out of a dumpster or anything. I wore brown work boots and jeans that had been washed and worn so much they were fading around the knees and butt. I had a long-sleeve t-shirt layered with a slightly tattered short sleeve t-shirt that once had some kind of logo printed on it, but since its purchase had peeled off, and over that a reddish-brown flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbows. What can I say, it was cold out.

After lunch I went to my English class and found out I was in the same class as Chunky Blonde. I sighed but did my best to pretend I didn’t remember her or care about her. Whether or not I convinced her, she felt the need to remind me what she thought of me when the teacher had the brilliant notion to make me stand up in front of the class and introduce myself. I got up and instantly felt my face get flare up into a deep blush. My arms were pressed tight to my sides and I could feel myself sweating.

“…Hi,” I managed to sputter. “I’m Imogene West, I, uh…came here from Portland…”

“Or maybe she just climbed out of the nearest dumpster,” Chunky Blonde smirked. One of her stupid little friends giggled. She sounded like a chipmunk with a cold.

“At least she isn’t built like a house,” a boy muttered from the back, a scruffy blonde with a strangely handsome face. “Oh wait, scratch that, a house doesn’t jiggle whenever it moves.”

Everyone laughed and the boy threw me a friendly smile. I smiled awkwardly and my eyes darted to the floor. I scurried back to my desk and tried to make my stupid blushing go away.

After class I walked out into the hall at the same time as the blonde boy and stammered out, “Thanks for that.”

He grinned broadly. “Don’t mention it. You just moved here right?”

“Yeah,” I said. News must’ve traveled faster than the speed of light in this town.

He shook his head. “Get out of here while you can. This place is Hell on Earth. Ask anyone.”

I followed after him as he walked away. “Wait, why?”

“It’s a small town what do you expect?” He stopped and slowly turned to me. “Just so you know, though, people are really fucking superstitious here. Are you superstitious?”

I shook my head. “Not really, no.”

“You should get that way. It’ll save your ass, believe me. Look, here are the basics, okay? Don’t go out on a full moon. Stay away from the cemetery and especially stay away from the mansion at the far side of it. The science lab under the stairs is haunted, the elementary school is haunted, if there is a house with boarded windows stay the fuck away and don’t go too far into the woods. Don’t even sleep outside.”

I stared. “Are you serious?”

“Would I risk sounding like a crazy person otherwise?”

“My biology class is under the stairs,” I muttered.

He scrunched his eyes, as if in thought. “So you’re in the class with Atticus Germaine.”

“Yeah, I sit next to him.” Did everyone know about this kid?

He shook his head. “Necrophiliac.”

I stared. “What?”

“Everyone knows it. The guy works in a morgue for Chrissake. He’s fucking weird, I bet you’ve already noticed it. And he’s a necrophiliac.”

I made a face. “You’re lying.”

He raised an eyebrow and grinned. “Ask anyone. The boy fucks dead people.”

I sighed in mock frustration. “Anyone else I should stay away from?”

“Uh, yeah, this kid Willis Thatcher? He’s fucking nuts. Some people think he’s killed a guy, and if you got stuck in a room with him you’re as good as dead. Real homicidal maniac.”

“What’s he look like?”

He smirked and did a sort of knowing eyebrow-bob-eye-roll thing.

I took a long breath. “You’re Willis.”

“I’m also late for class. ‘Bye for now.”

I watched him leave, slightly baffled by everything I’d just heard, and finally went to class.