Mothman's Curse (2 page)

On Saturdays, it seemed as if half the town hung around our place instead of their own perfectly good houses. Between the rubberneckers and the bargain hunters, it was hard to get a moment's peace.

Enter The Plan. When Momma was alive, our family would load up the car and head to the state fair every summer. Momma's apricot jam always won the first-place ribbon. Dad's skill with a rifle won us armfuls of stuffed toys on the midway. My brothers and I binged on funnel cakes and cotton candy. And Momma always said that when Fox was old enough, we'd sign him up for the junior bid call competition.

But then she got sick. Aunt Barb and Uncle Bill moved into the apartment above the garage to help out, and everything changed.

We hadn't been to the fair since Momma died three years ago. Dad said it didn't feel right going without her. All he ever wanted to do was work.

I missed Momma's too-loud laugh, and her smothering hugs, and the way she'd tuck my hair behind my ear and tell me my freckles were as beautiful as the stars in the sky. She was fearless and fun, the roller coaster to Dad's sure, steady Ferris wheel. I knew it would make her sad that we'd stopped going to Columbus. Plus Fox was turning twelve in June—old enough to compete at the fair. Maybe somehow, if we made it to the competition, she'd look down from heaven and see that her family was doing okay.

I didn't have any special talents, not like Fox or Dad or Momma or even Mason, who could eat a dozen hot dogs in three minutes flat. I wouldn't be winning any ribbons at the fair. But I could at least try to get us there. If that meant making sure we pooled every penny for the trip, then that was what I'd do.

All because Fox—as you might expect—was born to be an auctioneer.

Fox could sell water to a drowning man, could turn trash into a treasure map. Aside from the money we made from clueless customers, we held kids-only auctions twice a month with items we'd scrounged and salvaged and even a few we'd rescued from the garbage heap. Every kid within five miles knew that a Fox Fletcher auction was not to be missed—especially since Fox claimed that half the items were haunted. He got to practice his calling skills and earn money for The Plan at the same time.

I saw my brothers disappear into the corner store a quarter mile down the road. I took the camera from its case and looked it over, tracing the lines and curves with one finger.

I glanced around to see if anyone was nearby, then lifted the viewer to my eye and pressed the button, snapping a picture of the muddy pasture.

As I waited for the image to sharpen, a dark, blurred shadow began to form in the center of the picture. I squinted and held the photo inches from my nose …

 … And jumped when the shadow became a black-and-white image of a man staring grim-faced into the camera.

He wore thick, ugly glasses and a suit with a wide tie, like the kind in Grandpa's wedding photos. And he looked so sad I nearly burst into tears on the spot.

I stared. The field in the photograph looked normal, its colors unchanged. Only the man—the one who shouldn't be there—lacked any trace of color. My gaze traveled from the picture to the empty field in front of me, then back to the picture again. Fox had set this up somehow—I just knew it. I gave the camera a good shake, as if to dislodge whatever gadget he'd rigged to cause the unsettling image.

I saw the boys leave the store and head in my direction.

When Mason spotted me, he started to run. Fox chased him, the crisp air turning their cheeks rosy, their laughter floating ahead of them on the breeze.

“Are you taking pictures, Josie?” Mason mumble-shouted when he reached me, his mouth already stuffed with jawbreakers.

Fox pulled the photo from my hands. “Josie, who is this?”

“Like you don't know,” I said. “Some joke, Fox. You shouldn't be messing with stuff that's already up for sale.”

“What? I've never touched the camera before today.” He took a closer look at the photo. “You're telling me you took a picture of the field and this is what came out?” Fox's usual cool exterior slipped a little. He licked his lips. Even knowing what a good actor he was, I found myself believing him. “Must be a trick camera,” he said. “Or maybe an old image got transposed somehow. Josie, let me see that first photo I took of you.”

I took it from my pocket and turned it over.

There I was in full-color, freckled glory, and there was the man—same stark expression, black and white from head to toe—standing right behind me.

I yelped and flung the picture away. My skin felt too tight, the air too thick.

“Who is he?” Mason wondered.

Fox bent to pick up the fallen photo. “It has to be some kind of trick.”

“Now can I take it apart?” Mason said.

Fox and I answered together, “No!”

“Try another picture, Fox,” I said, handing him the camera. Maybe my voice shook a little, and maybe Fox's hands did, too, but he covered it well, careful not to let Mason see.

He spun a slow circle and stopped, facing our property in the distance: our house; the barn; the long, low building that served as the auction floor; the few hundred cars and trucks belonging to customers, parked in uneven rows along the muddy lot.

And not a person in sight.

Fox raised the camera and pressed the button. A picture fell into his outstretched hand. I watched over his shoulder to see what would appear. Mason stood on his tiptoes. We held our breath.

The details sharpened into focus. It was our property, all right—with one key difference: the drab figure of our mystery man, close enough to count the smudges on his glasses.

I shivered.

Fox kept his cool, though only just. “Josie, how much money do we have saved?”

I checked my notebook. “Eighty-seven dollars and twenty-two cents—minus whatever you just spent on candy.”

“We have to buy this camera.”

 

2

I ran to the house and up the stairs to my room to grab the lockbox with our savings inside. I fished the key from the chain around my neck and dragged the box from the darkest corner of my closet. The Polaroids went into the box, facedown. The money went into my jeans pocket.

Kneeling there on the closet floor, I felt a draft creep in through the open door and curl around me like smoke. I looked down to see my hand halfway to the lockbox again, itching to turn over the photos for one more look. My fingers twitched as I fought the urge. Before I could stop myself, I reached in and flipped over the top photo.

Sadness filled me as I stared at the man, his edges slightly smudged as if drawn with charcoal. My throat tightened. I couldn't shake the feeling that he was looking back at me. The sadness sharpened into worry and fear. Who was he? What did he want?

I dropped the photo into the box, slammed the lid, and hurried back to the auction floor.

Things looked much the same as they had earlier, but Tables 1 through 4 were empty. Many of the customers' cardboard boxes were full.

Dad's voice raced along, hawking a woman's pillbox hat.

Fox had returned the camera to its proper spot on Table 6. He stood close by, not guarding it exactly, but sending frequent glances in its direction. His posture screamed
relaxed
, both elbows resting on the table behind him, head cocked as if watching the bidding unfold with wide-eyed attention, as if he hadn't seen the same thing every Saturday since birth.

He was, in fact, looking for someone to help us. Once items made it to the auction floor, we weren't supposed to touch them. Dad took the rules seriously and made sure we did the same. Fox never should have messed with the camera in the first place. Bidding was our best option now, but only grown-ups were allowed to bid. We could ask one of the regulars to bid for us—brothers Carl and Joe, or Mr. Leonard, who owned the drugstore downtown. But we didn't want any questions. And if one of the regulars bid on something, you could bet the others would decide it was valuable and start a bidding war.

I watched Fox consider and reject a dozen people in the room before he noticed pink capris lady. She'd won her dog figurine—its head peeked out from the fanny pack around her middle.

Fox glanced at me; I nodded. We both approached her together, motioning her over for a hushed conversation at the back of the room.

“You got your dog,” Fox said with an easy smile. “Good for you. Hope it didn't set you back too much.”

She beamed. “Three dollars! Isn't he just the cutest? I can't believe there weren't more bidders!”

“This is my sister, Josie.”

The woman took my hand, embracing it with both of her own. “Hey there, Josie. My name's Amelia. What a charming big brother you have!”

“I'm older,” I blurted.

“Oh, I'm sorry, hon. Isn't this just the most fun ever? 'Course you two get to live it every week.”

“Yes, ma'am.” I didn't have the slightest idea how to ask this stranger for a favor.

Fox plunged right in. “Ms. Amelia, may we ask for your help?”

“Ask away.”

“There's a camera we'd like to buy, over there, but we're not allowed to bid. We have money,” he added quickly. “If you'd be willing…”

“Say no more. I'll be happy to bid for you. It's rather exciting, isn't it? I can't even understand what the auctioneer is saying.”

“It may be another hour or two before they get to it. If there's somewhere else you need to be…”

“Nonsense. I haven't had this much fun in ages. You two sit tight and leave it to me.”

Fox started fidgeting. His eyes shifted sideways and back, sideways and back.

His conscience was kicking in.

“The thing is, ma'am, I may not have been totally truthful before. About the dog being valuable.”

She winked. “I know. Don't let the fanny pack fool you. This old broad's not as gullible as she looks.” She patted the figurine. “I love it anyway. And I can appreciate two savvy kids looking to make a few bucks.”

Fox grinned. I didn't. If I'd been the one who'd conned her, no doubt she'd have marched out the door in a huff.

We waited. Items were sold and collected one by one. I leaned against the wall, drumming my fingers in rhythm with Dad's voice.

Finally it was time.

“And here we have a leather and chrome Polaroid SX-Seventy Land Camera, a great piece right there, comes with its own carrying case. Bill, any film in that camera?”

Uncle Bill doubled as a sort of awkward spokesmodel for the auction items. Imagine Frankenstein with gray, wavy hat hair and a few too many apple fritters in his belly, and you get Uncle Bill. He stood in his plaid shirt and Wranglers, stooping to make himself smaller, holding up the camera for all to see. He paused to remove the bottom panel, peek inside, and shake his head.

No film.

Fox and I exchanged startled glances. No
film
?

Dad started up his spiel again. “Okay, then, still a true piece of Americana right there. Let's hear ten, ten, ten dollar, ten dollar, ten, and thank you very much, sir, and fifteen, fifteen, fifteen, fifteen? And fifteen! Now twenty…”

Amelia raised her hand. She looked at us, eyebrows aloft. Fox nodded his approval. I chewed on my pencil. Maybe we used up all the film. Maybe it fell out. There had to be an explanation.

Fox gave the stink-eye to the man bidding against Amelia. What did the guy want with a useless old camera, anyway? Well, useless as far as he knew.

Another bidder joined in and the price jumped to thirty dollars. An empty pit churned where my stomach was supposed to be. I was glad I hadn't had time to eat my Hershey bar.

Amelia bid thirty-five dollars, then forty-five. Sixty dollars. I murdered that poor pencil, waiting and worrying, until the other bidders finally shook their heads and withdrew.

“That's sixty, sixty dollars, once, twice, and sold to the lady in pink.”

Aunt Barb, seated next to Dad at the podium, recorded the transaction in the logbook. Amelia held up her bidder's card: number 98. Uncle Bill carried the camera over and placed it in her outstretched hands.

I slumped, overcome by a mix of relief and buyer's remorse. There went a good chunk of our hard-earned money—our trip money—and for what?

A broken-down clunker of a camera that took pictures without film. Creepy pictures of a creepy man that sent chills down my spine and right back up again.

I couldn't shake the sudden, sinking feeling that our sixty dollars had bought us a lot more trouble than we'd bargained for.

*   *   *

We took our new camera someplace where we could count on total privacy: an old wood shack we called the Cave. Hunched under a clump of trees behind our house, it made the perfect base of operations for Fox's auctions. We'd sent Mason there before the bidding to wait while we secured the camera. The kid had plenty of useful skills; he just had no poker face.