I Have a Bad Feeling About This (16 page)

Monica's parents liked to say that she was born without the fear gene. She did have fears, but they were more about “What if I'm friendless?” than “What if I get shot by criminals?” Though putting her life in this much jeopardy was extreme even by her standards, it had to be done.

Okay, there were three bad guys. Mr. Grand was busy talking to Henry. Chad was busy pointing a gun at Erik. Ethan had been busy getting rid of the dead body and hopefully would continue being busy with that. So unless there was another bad guy unaccounted for (and Monica thought that Henry had probably counted correctly because three was a pretty low number), all she really had to do was move quickly and hope that Ethan didn't come back inside.

Oh, yeah, and she also had to hope that the back window was unlocked. Henry said that he remembered opening it when they burned a microwavable burrito and it hadn't been locked then, so it most likely wasn't locked now. If it was, she'd have to dive through it, which Monica didn't think you could do without getting a concussion and about seven thousand cuts. If at all possible, she wanted to avoid a plan of action where she got shredded.

She darted out of the woods, moving like the ninja she'd always known she could be. She reached the window, which had approximately eighty-three thousand dead bugs on the sill, and gently but quickly slid it open.

With either the skill of a mighty Olympian or a sneaky burglar, she climbed through the window and then leapt down off the kitchen counter onto the tile floor, landing almost silently.

Nobody was in the kitchen to shoot her. This was a good start.

Though she had no time to waste, she thought it would be a fine idea to take a few seconds to scavenge a weapon or two just in case she had an unexpected visitor. She pulled open the first drawer. A butcher knife. Perfect. You could mess somebody up with a butcher knife.

She opened a cabinet. Plastic glasses. Less useful than the butcher knife. There was also a frying pan, which was not typically stored next to glasses, but whatever. So she grabbed that. It had a thick layer of brownish fossilized-looking gook on the bottom. They actually ate things that had been cooked on this? Vile.

She hurried out of the kitchen, making sure not to step on any of the food (?) that littered the floor. She shifted the frying pan to her left hand, the same one that held the knife, as she went over to the closet door. She turned the handle. Locked.

If she'd had a paper clip and a few extra minutes, she thought, she could pick the lock. But she didn't have either of those, so she hurried across the room toward Max's office.

Oh, jeez, there was still blood on the floor. She stopped, momentarily dizzy. Monica had caused her brothers to have many bloody noses in her life, but actually seeing blood from a murdered human being made her queasy.

Suck
it
up, girl
, she thought.
No, not the blood. Power through this. You don't have time to be sick to your stomach.

She ignored the blood and rushed into Max's office. A key ring dangled from a hook next to the door. She grabbed the keys and left the office, thinking that this was going pretty well so far.

She winced. What a stupid thing to think. It was the perfect cue for the door to open.

The door opened.

Her first instinct was to hide, but the only place to hide was under Max's desk. No matter how agile you were, there wasn't much damage you could do to an opponent while crammed underneath a tiny desk. If they made even the most halfhearted effort to search the place, they'd find her, and the best she'd be able to do is let out a girlish little giggle and hope to charm the killers, which was not a fantastic strategy.

So she had to go on the offensive.

She rushed at the door, resisting the urge to let out a primal yell since primal yells tended to alert others in the general vicinity to your presence.

Monica knew that the correct move would be a butcher knife to the throat since the noise would be “
Auuck! Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle!
” instead of the loud “
Clang!
” of a frying pan to the skull. But deep inside, she knew she was not prepared to stab somebody in the neck. It just wasn't part of her personality profile.

She dropped the knife and kept the pan.

As Ethan's eyes widened at the sight of a sixteen-year-old girl charging him (probably not a sight he'd expected at this particular moment), she flipped the pan around and smacked him in the face with the sticky side.

There was a definite
clang
, but it was a muted clang.

Ethan dropped to his knees. The pan stuck to his face.

He clutched at it and tried to pry it off, but the pan remained firmly stuck there. “
It
burns!
” he wailed.

Monica kicked the door shut and locked it. She should have locked it in the first place, but oh well, she'd know that for next time. Then she kicked the pan, which made Ethan thrash around a bit less.

She couldn't see his gun. Maybe he didn't have one. Better to stick with her plan than to waste time searching for a gun that might not be there.

She sprinted for the closet. There were six or seven keys on the ring, none of which were helpfully labeled “This is the key to the closet that has the big black bag full of useful weapons,” so she tried the first one, which didn't fit.

Somebody began to pound on the main door. It shook on its hinges. Monica hoped it didn't bring the entire building down.

Ethan stood up, still wailing about how it burned and still trying to tear the pan off his face.

The second key didn't fit.

A gunshot. From…oh, about twenty feet away. So Ethan was packing heat after all. Fortunately, he was still blind and was apparently just shooting in random directions.

The third key fit. Monica opened the closet door just as a bullet put a hole through it. There it was—a big black bag. She picked it up—it was way heavier than she'd expected—and hurried into the kitchen, trying to keep herself from toppling over from the weight of the bag.

Ethan kept pulling the trigger, even though his gun was now just clicking.

She glanced back at him. What if she made Ethan into her hostage? They could do a trade.

No, hostages were more useful when somebody cared about them. Mr. Grand would probably just shrug and say, “He's yours. Use his head as a flowerpot.”

Ethan ripped the pan off his face. Monica had never had a wax job, but her understanding was that it was not a pleasant process. Ethan, who'd suddenly had the equivalent of a wax job on his mustache, goatee, and left eyebrow, seemed to agree with that assessment. He bellowed in pain.

The pounding on the front door continued.

Monica ran for the window.

She tossed the bag on the counter, hoping she hadn't just given herself a hernia. As she leapt up there, Ethan let out a primal yell. She could hear his footsteps squeak behind her as she shoved the bag out of the open window.

There was a clatter, a yelp, an even louder squeak, and a thud. Without having seen any of this, Monica thought that he'd probably tripped on the butcher knife and then slipped on the blood and then fell on his butt.

She jumped out of the window. She grabbed the black bag, hurting her shoulder in the process, and then raced into the woods.

***

Ethan lay on the floor, not sure if he was looking at his left foot or if his right foot was twisted wrong. He'd tripped on a butcher knife that he hadn't expected to be there, slipped on the blood that he should have known to avoid, and fallen on his butt. He wasn't sure if the pain or the shame was worse.

He was definitely looking at his right foot, so the pain was worse.

The door burst open, the top hinge popping right off. “What happened?” Chad asked.

“What do you
think
happened?” Ethan said, hoping that Chad would not draw the conclusion that he'd been defeated by a teenage girl.

Chad ran over and looked in the closet. “Where is he?”

“I don't know!”

“Is he still here?”

“I don't know!”

“What happened to your facial hair?”

“It was horrible!”

Chad looked into the kitchen and then back at Ethan. “He must've gone out the window! Who was it?”

Ethan wondered if a lie would come back to haunt him. He suspected that it would but decided it was worth the risk. “A great big kid! Giant kid! Maybe not even a kid!”

Chad cursed. “We need to forget about the kids and get out of here.”

***

Randy slammed Monica's pocketknife into the second tire of Mr. Grand's car. He, Henry, and Monica had been worried the men would just leave, taking Erik with them, but this would put a stop to that.

***

“What's going on in there?” Mr. Grand called out at the sound of a
clang
.

Ethan didn't answer.

Mr. Grand, Chad, Henry, and Erik listened carefully, with Mr. Grand and Chad hoping there wouldn't be any more surprising noises and Henry and Erik hoping there would be all kinds of them.

When the gunshots started, Mr. Grand nodded to Chad. “Check it out.”

Chad ran off. Now, instead of each of them having a man point a gun at them, Henry and Erik were being shared by Mr. Grand's gun. Henry didn't feel significantly safer.

***

Randy had nearly had a heart attack when Ethan went into the building; however, he'd been on the other side of the car and Ethan didn't see him. Randy slammed the pocketknife into the last two tires, nearly having another heart attack when Chad came running around the corner. Had Chad not been so distracted by pounding on the door, he probably would have at least seen Randy's elbow, but he didn't.

With all of the tires flat, Randy scampered back into the woods.

***

As the last gunshot rang out, Henry cried out, clutched at his chest, and fell to the ground.

“Hi, everybody, this is Rad Rad Roger, coming to you live from the holding cell at my favorite local police station. They wouldn't let me bring my camera crew or even a camera, but that's okay! Rad Rad Roger is gonna do his show anyway!”

“Hey, shut up!”

“I haven't finished reading
I
Have
a
Bad
Feeling
About
This,
but it looks like our main character, Henry, just died, which is weird because I was talking to him and he didn't say anything about dying. Maybe he did and I don't remember. Rad Rad Roger has had a lot to drink tonight. Is it still tonight?”

“You want to get shanked? Shut up!”

“Anyway, even though he died, it was good to see Henry find his courage and be a hero and stuff. It's too bad he died before he could hook up with Monica. I guess there are still a few more chapters left in the book, so anything could happen, but I think we should shift gears and talk about Sandy Klifton's baby bump!”

“I warned you!”

“Uh-oh, this is Rad Rad Roger, signing off for AAACCCK!!!”

Henry's life did not flash before his eyes because he was totally faking it. Though he'd been told quite clearly not to move, he thought that Mr. Grand would make an exception for him getting shot. As he dropped to the ground, Henry hoped that Mr. Grand wouldn't say, “Oh, well, he's been shot anyway. Might as well put a couple more in his head.”

He also hoped that Erik would use this opportunity to do…something. Henry wasn't sure what. He didn't care as long as it turned out to be useful.

Erik cried out and dropped to the ground.

Henry didn't see a bullet hole in the side of the building, so he was pretty sure that Erik was faking it too. It wouldn't take long for their scheme to come unraveled. Henry wished he had a packet of ketchup handy to smash against his chest.

“How stupid do you think I am?” asked Mr. Grand. It was clear from his tone that the correct answer was not “Stupid enough to think that both of you just got shot.”

Mr. Grand cursed as something hit him in the face.

***

Ha
, thought Randy, who could tell that Henry and Erik were faking. Nobody could say that he couldn't throw a rock well when the need arose!

***

The boys attacked.

Henry went for Mr. Grand's right leg, Erik went for his left leg, and together they pulled him off balance. Mr. Grand's head smacked into the side of the building and he fell to the ground, not moving.

Erik pulled the gun out of his hand.

“Go!” Erik whispered, gesturing for Henry to run back into the woods.

“I'm not leaving you!”

“I'm not staying behind, you geek! Go before they come back! Go! Go! Go!”

Henry and Erik rushed back into the woods. Henry wondered if it was a bad idea not to shoot Mr. Grand while he lay there, knocked out. In a movie, he'd probably be all like “Shoot him, you fools!” but in real life, murdering an unconscious human being seemed wrong, even if that unconscious human being would happily murder you while you were unconscious.

They immediately joined up with Randy and continued running through the woods, barely able to believe that they'd gotten away. Henry already wanted to start talking about how much they rocked, but there'd be time for that later.

“Hold on a second,” he said, stopping. He let out a birdcall and they all listened carefully for a response.

Monica let out a birdcall back—a somewhat pained-sounding birdcall but a birdcall nevertheless. She was okay!

“We did it,” said Erik.

“Do you think we should have shot him?” asked Henry.

“I don't know about you, but I kind of like that I won't have horrible nightmares about what I've done.”

“Yeah, good point.” Henry let out another birdcall. Monica responded, closer this time.

Once again, there was no evidence that the men were coming into the woods after them. Henry was almost a little disappointed by this. If Mr. Grand, Ethan, and Chad would chase after them in a blind rage, screaming something ridiculous like “You're doomed! Doooooomed!” Henry felt that he and the others could take them out.

He also knew that he was probably wrong about this and that it was quite fortunate that the evil men weren't chasing them.

He did another birdcall. Monica responded.

“I'm sure they've figured out those aren't real birds,” said Randy. “You could probably just speak in English.”

Henry had been thinking the same thing, but the birdcalls felt somewhat more romantic. Not that he was thinking in romantic terms. There was a time and place for such feelings and it wasn't after nearly being…well, no, actually, immediately after surviving almost certain death was the
perfect
time for thoughts of romance. The only way it could've been better is if he'd put his life at risk for her instead of vice versa.

And then, there she was.

She was sitting on the ground next to the big black bag. She'd done it! They didn't really
need
the weapons anymore, but it was awesome that they had them just in case. The bag was open and many of its wonderful contents, like rifles, were spread around.

Monica didn't look quite as happy as Henry would've hoped, but she did give him a big one-armed hug. His initial thought—that she was too repulsed by him to embrace him with both arms, which he supposed was a reasonable repulsion—was eased when she showed him how badly swollen her arm was. Not that he was happy that her arm was injured, but he'd rather have her arm hurt than to have her not like him.

That sounded really selfish. He was glad he hadn't said it out loud.

“I thought you said he kept the ammo in the bag,” said Monica.

“He does. He keeps everything in the bag.”

Monica shook her head. “There's no ammo in here. Unless we want to go after them with one bow and a few arrows, this stuff is worthless.”

“Oh,” said Henry. “Well, that's not cool.”

“Nope.”

“It's fine though,” said Randy. “Stu's on his way to get help and none of us are kidnapped anymore, so we can just get out of here.”

Monica held up the key ring. “We could go for Max's car, but I guess it's better to just hike to music camp.”

“Yeah, we don't want to take another big risk,” said Henry. “Maybe we'll catch up to Stu.”

***

Still no signal. This was ridiculous. They should have
extra
cell phone coverage in the middle of the forest, not less, because this is when people needed it most!

Stu sighed with frustration. At least he was still walking in the right direction. That is, at least he was ninety percent certain he was still walking in the right direction. Or had been a few minutes ago. Now it was closer to a fifty-fifty thing.

He did not have the slightest freaking clue where he was going.

How could the others have been so stupid as to trust him with this task? Walk straight. Yeah, right. Unless you possessed the ability to magically pass through trees, which Stu did not, you couldn't walk straight in the woods. Even without the trees, the ground was all bumpy and it kept sending you off course.

He was going to die, and thus, everybody else was going to die. This wasn't how he wanted to perish. He wanted to perish by being shot out of a cannon when he was ninety-five. Dying of starvation alone in the woods wasn't nearly as cool.

He heard something.

A growl.

Not a human growl.

Not a cheerful growl.

Stu would be extremely pleased if this was not a bear.

It could be anything. Lots of things growled. Harmless, adorable little forest creatures like bushy-tailed squirrels or chubby-cheeked chipmunks. Maybe it was even a baby bird with a vocal defect.

Stu froze as something moved not too far ahead of him.

It was partially hidden by the trees, but it was way bigger than a chipmunk.

It was brown, hairy, and approximately the size of a bear. This didn't necessarily mean that it was a bear. It could have been a squirrel that somehow shared the dimensions of a bear, although that would be even more frightening than a regular bear.

The animal stepped into plain view.

Yep, it was a bear.

Stu tried to remember what you were supposed to do if you encountered a bear. Were you supposed to make lots of noise and rush at it, with the assumption that a bear was more afraid of you than you were of it? Or were you supposed to back away quietly, saying “Nice bear…nice bear—” in a trembling voice?

If he could get a cell phone signal, he'd google it.

He did know that you weren't supposed to run away, unless your goal was for the bear to pounce on you and start devouring your back.

So he'd go for calmness. Calmness was the key.

The bear looked at him.

Stu whimpered.

He wished he had some bear snacks available—that is, besides his own flesh.

“Hello, Baloo,” he said, backing away in frame-by-frame slow motion. “How's everything going with you? Having a pleasant afternoon? I trust your hibernation went well this year?”

The bear stepped forward toward him.

Stu's hand suddenly became drenched with about a quart of perspiration and Monica's phone slipped out and fell to the ground.

He crouched down, but the bear's growl grew louder, as if it were suggesting that retrieving the phone was not a good idea. He didn't think the bear actually wanted the phone for itself. The phone was a couple of years out of date and the front was all scratched up—and also, this was a bear—but he decided to leave the phone behind.

He knew he shouldn't run, but as the bear charged at him, he decided to anyway.

***

Mr. Grand's rage was so intense that he wanted to rip off Ethan's other eyebrow. But he restrained himself. This was no time to lose control and you couldn't just rip somebody's eyebrow off with your fingers anyway.

Once this situation was resolved, he had every intention of beating either Ethan or Chad to death. Probably not both of them, but one of them for sure. It would make him feel better. He'd listen to a soothing Beethoven symphony while he did it.

Chad was busy trying to hot-wire Max's truck but having no luck.

“I don't know if this makes you feel any better,” said Ethan, “but kids these days, they aren't like when we were kids. They're faster and stronger. They've got more minerals in the water and stuff, so if they get the best of us, it's really not as disgraceful as you might think.”

“Do you believe deep in your heart that there was any possibility that comment would make me feel better?”

“Well, no,” Ethan admitted. “But it makes me feel better.”

“It shouldn't,” said Mr. Grand. “What's happened here today is pathetic on a cosmic scale. You were hit in the head by a frying pan. There is nothing redeemable about that.”

Ethan shrugged. “At least we killed Max. That's what we came for, right? Mission accomplished.”

Mr. Grand wanted to lunge at the eyebrow but regained his composure. “Don't talk,” he said. “Don't ever talk again. Live the rest of your life as a mute. Imagine that any time you open your mouth, a giant fist will slam into it because that's exactly what's going to happen!”

Mr. Grand cursed silently. He was so upset by this turn of events that he was making threats that had only a tiny fraction of his usual wit and menace. Imagine that a giant fist will slam into it? How inept.

“How's it going?” he asked Chad.

“Is that rhetorical or do you want the real answer? Because the real answer is crap.”

“Give me the crap answer.”

“This isn't working. This truck is one step up from a make-it-yourself pinewood derby car. I honestly don't know how it even runs. I'd have more luck hot-wiring a Martian spacecraft.”

“Wonderful. Just wonderful.” Mr. Grand wanted to kick something, anything. Preferably something with bones inside. He'd just gotten off the blood pressure medication, but his capillaries were going to explode if they didn't catch some sort of lucky break.

“Hey, what's going on?” asked a small green-haired kid, walking over to the truck.