Sam held on to the wheel and kept the gas pedal down, and watched the house’s front porch come at him on the right. It slid by the passenger side of the car, and a second later the Escort was on the grass, pointed back out at the street and accelerating. Sam cranked the steering wheel hard to the right and straightened the vehicle out. He snapped his gaze in both directions along the road, hoping one of them would be clear of lurching bodies.

Neither was.

Sam held the wheel straight as the car launched itself across the road and onto the opposite lawn. Ahead of him loomed a pitch-black gap between adjacent houses. He had no idea how to turn on the vehicle’s headlights—was pretty damned sure they would have only lit up the smoke, anyway.

An instant later he was into the gap, the two houses rushing past, falling away behind him, the deep void of their back yards swallowing him up.

The seconds that followed were surreal. He could see the lampposts of the next street, maybe two hundred feet ahead of him, and the silhouettes of houses over there, but everything closer than that was invisible: a formless dark through which he was driving at thirty miles per hour.

Something blurred past the driver’s side window—maybe a wooden play set. He had hardly processed this thought when another shape rose up straight in front of him. He slammed his foot on the brake, felt the Escort’s wheels lock up and slide on the grass, and held on tight to the steering wheel.

The impact jolted the car. Sam was thrown forward, his hands slipping off the wheel. Then his body pitched backward—he found himself sagging into the seatback, as if the car were pointed nose-up on a steep, steep hill.

Silence, except for his heartbeat knocking in his chest.

Then another sound: distant screams outside, in the darkness behind the car.

Move. Right now.

He took a deep breath and forced it back out. He felt for the door release handle, pulled it and shoved on the door with his elbow.

The door moved—but only a little. There was some kind of resistance pushing back against it.

For a second he was sure it was jammed against something—a heavy shrub, maybe. Then he pushed it farther, and realized what he was feeling: there was nothing pressing against the door; the thing was just heavy. Because of the car’s strange upward tilt, the door needed to be pushed up, not out.

Sam braced himself and shoved the door with all his force. It swung upward and open, and he leaned out and fell three feet, hitting the ground with his shoulder.

Above him in the dark, the door fell shut again with a resonant thud and click.