“Jeremy,” she says, “your friend Charlie — I don’t think he’s your friend.”

“He is,” Jeremy says, but he looks ready to cry. “He says he can fix everything. He can make it right.”

“Right? Make what right?”

“I — I’ve done some things. It’s not all Charlie. He said he would fix it. He promised.”

His breath is hitching in his chest now, on the verge of breaking into sobs. Oh, this poor goddamned kid.

“Jeremy. Listen to me. I don’t know what he did — I don’t know what you did — but it’s not important now. We have to get out of here before he comes back. I can help you. I can take you back to your parents, I can help you go back home — ”

Jeremy shudders and looks at her. The tears are still wet on his cheeks, but his face breaks out in a wide grin.

“And why the fuck,” he says, emphasizing every syllable, “would I ever want to do that?”

She realizes his eyes, his perfect blue eyes, are not blue anymore. They are lightless pools of black.

Grace recoils. She scoots away from the little boy, almost back to the wall.

“You had to keep poking, didn’t you, Grace?” Jeremy says now. “I could hear you, all the way down where I was. You really upset him. He came running to me all trembling and weepy.”

She recognizes him. It’s the deep, gravelly voice she hears yelling at Kirk and Susan.

“We haven’t met yet. I’m Charlie,” he says.

She can almost see another person now, hanging over Jeremy’s head, like a ghost. A man, grizzled and ancient, his hard eyes glaring at her.

She is shaking while he stares. She feels like she is being X-rayed, like something is scouring her bones.

“The boy is mine,” he says. “Do not ever test that again. Do you hear me, you half-bright mongrel? You don’t need to rush into dying. It’s coming for you soon enough.”

Grace nods quickly, still trembling. The boy and his spirit double nod, at the same time.

“Good,” he says. “I’m doing you a favor. You don’t want the boy either. If I was really cruel, I’d let him loose on you.”

Charlie pulls back. The vision of him fades from view. A moment later, Grace wonders if he was ever really there.

And Jeremy looks at her again with those wide innocent eyes. Which, she notices, are blue again.

“Grace?” He looks concerned. “Are you okay? Don’t you want to play with me anymore?”

Grace pulls herself together. She masks her fear with as happy a smile as she can manage.

And wonders what will happen if she says no.

INTERLUDE: Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

INTERLUDE

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

MIDDLETON. THEN.