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Authors: Martin H. Greenberg

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BOOK: A Girl's Guide to Guns and Monsters
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My heart was pounding so hard, I thought it would burst. Then I thought I would suffocate since her fingers were over my nose and mouth and I couldn’t breathe. I kicked and tried to hit her, but she was too big and too strong.
The man said, “Take it easy. We don’t want the kid dead.”
She bent down so her eyes were looking right into mine. “If I let you go, do you promise not to scream?”
Her eyes were big and black and serious.
I nodded.
She loosened her grip and led me over to the couch. Then she shoved me and I sat down, hard.
The man sat down beside me. He put one hand on my head. In his other hand he had a gun.
“You are a very pretty little girl. What’s your name?”
I was trying very hard not to look at the gun. I clamped my lips together. I don’t talk to strangers.
“How old are you?” he asked then. “Eight? Nine? You must be the result of the congratulatory screw your momma gave your dad after he sent me to prison.”
The woman shushed him. “You don’t have to be so crude. None of this is her fault.”
He smiled. Not the kind of smile that’s friendly. He was staring down at me again. “Your daddy told you not to talk to strangers, right? Too bad he didn’t tell you not to answer the door.”
He looks around. “Where is your daddy? Upstairs?” He tilted his head as if listening. “It’s a good bet you’re not here alone.”
I listened, too. I didn’t hear Aunt Anna anymore. I didn’t hear anything. Something wiggled in my stomach. She didn’t leave me alone when she heard them, did she?
The man got up and headed for the stairs. I heard him clomping around up there, going from room to room.
The woman pointed to the TV. “What are you watching?”
She picked up the remote and the DVD flickered on. The preview this time was
A Nightmare on Elm Street.
“I can’t believe they let you watch this stuff.” She tossed the remote on the couch beside me. “Where are your parents, kid? We know they wouldn’t leave you alone.”
The man came back. He shook his head. “He’s not up there. I’ll try the kitchen.”
“They’re next door.” The words seemed to come out by themselves. “At the neighbors. They’ll be right back so you’d better get out quick.”
They smiled at each other. The woman said, “You do have a tongue. Good. When will they be back?”
They both stared at me. I bit my lip. “Soon. They just went over to see the new baby.”
The man quirked a finger at the woman and they moved away and whispered at each other. When I looked up, I saw Aunt Anna peeking around the kitchen door. She put her fingers to her lips and nodded. Then she stepped back out of sight.
My stomach was not wiggling so much now. When the man and the woman came back to stand near the couch, the man had a phone in his hand.
“Call them. Tell them to come home.”
He pushed the phone into my hand. I knew the neighbor’s number but I was afraid to call it. I started to dial and the man stopped my fingers and pushed a button. “Speaker’s on, kid, so don’t fuck around.”
Now I was really scared. When the neighbor answered, the man would know I lied. Just then, our telephone rang. The man snatched his phone from my hands and bent to look at the caller ID. “Who’s Anna Strong?”
Something told me just what to answer. “She’s the neighbor.”
He handed me the receiver. At the same time, he pulled the gun from inside his jacket and pointed it at me. “Tell your daddy to come home now.”
He looked around the phone for the speaker button but couldn’t find it so he put the gun next to my head. “Tell them just to come home. Nothing else.”
I picked up the receiver. “Hello?” I tried to keep my voice from shaking.
“Elizabeth. Listen closely. You’re doing great. Say, ‘I’m fine. But I need you to come home.’ ”
I did. The man nodded at me.
Aunt Anna said, “Say, ‘I can’t get the TV to work.’ Like they’re asking you why.”
I repeated what Aunt Anna said, then added, “ ‘Hannah Montana’ will be on in ten minutes. It’s my favorite program.”
“Good girl. Now say good-bye. I’m watching. It will be over soon.”
When I hung up the phone, the man put the gun back in his jacket and patted my head like I was a baby. “Nice work. You’re a born liar. Like your dad.”
The way he said it made me mad. “My daddy is not a liar. You’ll be sorry you said that.”
He looked at the way my fists curled up in a ball and he laughed. “You are a feisty one. Maybe when this is over—”
The woman slapped his arm. “Forget it, Jake. We’re not hurting the kid.”
Quicker than I can take a breath he slapped her, hard, across the mouth. “You fucking idiot. You used my name.”
She fell back onto the couch and rubbed her cheek. Her eyes got big and shiny, like she was trying not to cry.
He looked at his watch. “How long does it take to walk fifty fucking feet?”
He went over to the window. “Which house?”
I wasn’t sure what he meant so I asked, “What?”
He came back to the couch so fast, it made me jump. “I said, which house?”
I start to shake my head because I still didn’t understand what he was asking me.
The woman put an arm out in front of me. “Don’t you touch her,” she said. “We agreed. We want the kid’s dad. No one else.”
The way his eyes looked made me think he wanted to hit her again. Or me. I tried to make myself small but he pushed the woman’s arm away and reached for me anyway. He grabbed my arm and gave it a shake. “Right or left. Which house?”
I tried to think. His fingers hurt my arm but I wouldn’t let him see that. I wish I knew if either of the neighbors was home tonight. “Left,” I said, crossing my fingers.
He went back to the window. But he was there only a minute before he turned to look at me. “There are no lights on in that house.”
His eyes were angry again. “If you tricked me with that phone call, there is going to be trouble. I want your daddy. But I’ll settle for you.” He smiled. “In fact, you might even be better. More fun for me. Clearer message for him.”
He came toward me and the woman sprang up at him. “I said leave her alone.”
He didn’t even stop. He raised his gun and hit her. She fell so hard, I was sure she was dead. He was almost at the couch. I grabbed the remote and threw it at him as hard as I could. It just bounced off his chest and he laughed but it gave me a chance to crawl away under the coffee table.
He grabbed the corner of the table and lifted it up. “Come out, come out wherever you are,” he said. “Come on. I won’t hurt you. Much.”
“Get away from her.”
There was a blur from the kitchen. A
blur
. Like when a cartoon character moves really fast. Only it wasn’t a cartoon character.
It was Aunt Anna.
She tackled the man before he could raise his gun again. She hit him so hard they both fell back against the wall. But Aunt Anna, her face was
different
. Her eyes flashed, and they were greenish-yellow, like a cat’s. Her mouth was open. Her teeth were funny, too—pointy with two long fangs.
I looked and looked. I’d seen people like this before. A long time ago, in a movie I wasn’t supposed to watch.
They were called vampires.
Aunt Anna?
She grabbed the man and shook him like he was a doll. He was looking at her face and screaming. He dropped the gun but Aunt Anna didn’t let go. She had his face in her hands and she pulled him toward her. She stripped off the mask and put her mouth right on his neck.
Then she looked at me.
Something changed in her face. She stepped back a little, nodded at me, and swung her fist. The man’s jaw kind of moved sideways. He dropped just like the woman had when he hit her with a gun. Only Aunt Anna just used her fist. She grabbed his gun and stuck it on top of the television.
Then she ran over to me and scooped me up. “Are you all right?”
She was hugging me so hard, I thought I might break. Where our cheeks touched, her skin was very cold. After a few seconds, she held me away from her. Her face was normal again.
“He didn’t hurt you, did he?”
“No. You are
very
fast.”
She looked at me the way adults looks at each other when they have something serious to discuss. She brought me to the couch and we sat down together.
“What you saw me do—what you saw me become, I’m sorry if I scared you.”
I shook my head. “That man scared me more.”
Her lips turned up, like she wanted to smile but shouldn’t. “I know. But I have to ask you to do something that you may not understand. I wouldn’t ask you at all if it wasn’t so important.”
I sat very still and put my hands together to show her I was listening.
“I have to ask you to keep what you saw me do a secret—between the two of us. No one else can know. Not even your parents or Uncle David. Can you do that?”
Just then we heard lots of sirens coming down the street. Aunt Anna looked toward the door and then back at me. “I don’t have time to explain why right now. I will soon though, I promise. Do you trust me?”
I nodded my head. “You saved me. I trust you. You can trust me, too. I promise not to say anything.”
And I did the best thing I could do to show her how serious I was. I crossed my heart and held out a pinkie finger. “Pinkie promise.”
She linked her pinkie with mine and we sealed the oath.
There were lights flashing outside by now and someone banged on the door.
Aunt Anna went to open it and lots of policemen in uniform burst in. Right behind them came Mommy and Daddy. They practically knocked Aunt Anna down to get to me. There was a lot of hugging and kissing and asking if I was all right.
The man who broke in was beginning to wake up. A policeman put handcuffs on him and hauled him to his feet. Another policeman did the same to the woman, but she was bleeding from the back of the head and they weren’t so rough with her.
As soon as the man saw Aunt Anna, he began to yell. “Look at her. She’s a monster. She has eyes like a cat and she tried to bite me. I think she’s a fucking vampire.”
He must have seen the movie, too.
Of course, Aunt Anna didn’t have eyes like a cat anymore and she was sitting quietly on the sofa so the policemen just rolled their eyes at him and told him to shut up.
Daddy came to sit with Aunt Anna, Mommy, and me on the couch.
“Who is he?” Mommy asked Daddy in her you-have-some-explaining-to-do voice. She still had her arms tight around my shoulders.
Daddy looked sad and angry at the same time. “His name is Jake Halloran. He and his brother, Frank, shot a convenience store clerk nine years ago. I was the prosecutor on the case. Jake wasn’t the trigger man, so he did his time and was released on parole.”
“Why did he come after you?” Aunt Anna asked.
“We heard that his brother was killed in prison. A week before
his
parole hearing. I guess he holds me responsible.”
“And the woman?”
“Frank Halloran’s widow.”
Daddy turned to Aunt Anna. “I can’t thank you enough for calling us. And for saving our little girl. I don’t know how you did it. He had a gun. David was right when he said you are one hell of a woman.”
The man in the corner starts to yell again. “She’s not a woman. She’s something else. Her teeth are pointy and she has fangs. Tell her to open her mouth. She has fangs. I’m telling you, she’s a vampire.”
Aunt Anna smiled at him. I guess to show how normal her teeth were. Then she said to my daddy, “It’s Elizabeth who is one hell of a woman. She never got scared and she never lost her head. If anyone deserves credit for what happened here, it’s your daughter.”
I was really proud. No one ever called me a woman before. Even Mommy and Daddy were looking at me as if I wasn’t a little girl any more. I scooted over to hug Aunt Anna and she hugged me back.
The police were ready to take the man and woman away. He was still screaming that Aunt Anna was a monster and they should be arresting her, too.
Aunt Anna and I looked at each other and I knew she could tell what I was thinking.
There are monsters in the world. I know it for sure now. That man would have hurt Daddy and me . . . or worse. There
are
monsters.
But my friend Aunt Anna isn’t one of them. She’s brave and strong and didn’t even need a gun to get that bad guy. I can’t wait for her to tell me how she did it. If becoming a vampire is the secret, I want to be just like her when I grow up.
LUPERCALIA
Anton Strout
A
lot of people had walked through the doors of New York’s Serendipity on East Sixtieth Street over the years, but it was doubtful that any had come in with a crossbow strapped across their back. In that respect, Leis Colchis was singular. Her roommate, Helen Leda, certainly didn’t have one on her. Helen hadn’t even realized Leis had one until she took off her winter cloak in the restaurant.
“Is that what I think it is?” she whispered. “I’m pretty sure our R.A. would tell us that we’re not allowed to have one of those in our dorm room.” Although no one was paying attention to the pretty, long- haired blonde with the weapon yet, Helen figured it was only a matter of time.
Leis turned to her. “Good thing we’re not on NYU property then,” she said. Leis dropped her cloak onto a bench by the front door and released the crossbow’s strap.
Helen grabbed Leis’s arm. “You’re not going to hurt anyone, are you? I know you’re pissed with James and everything . . .”
Leis pulled away from her dark- haired roommate with ease. Helen’s grip wasn’t strong enough to hold on, and for once the petite girl wished she was a little stronger so she could restrain her friend.
“Relax,” Leis said. “I’m not going to hurt anyone who doesn’t deserve it . . .”
BOOK: A Girl's Guide to Guns and Monsters
10.37Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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