But then his hands went to his buckle. He yanked his belt free of the loops on his jeans and came at me. At first I thought he was going to whip me. Then I remembered Mrs. McCafferty and her hank of long hair, and I realized he was going to restrain me.

And then do what?

My hands whitened around the baling hooks. The curved metal spikes stuck out from between the knuckles of my fists.

“Please don’t,” I said. “Uncle Jim? Please don’t. Don’t make me.”

His face lost to shadow, he kept on, readying the leather strap with his hands.

I raised my weaponed fists. “Please don’t.”

I could hear Patrick running to catch up. He wouldn’t be here in time.

Uncle Jim’s boots kept on, tramping across the mud, closer and closer.

I was crying. “Don’t.”

And then he was on me.

I sidestepped him and swung the baling hook. It embedded itself in his throat. He made a terrible gurgling sound and sank to his knees. I shook the spike free of his neck as Patrick finally arrived, his face flushed from his sprint.

Uncle Jim got one boot under him, then another. He stood, blood streaming from his neck, soaking the front of his jacket. As Patrick raised the shotgun, I turned my head, not wanting to see.

I heard the boom.

I heard the sound of a body hitting the dirt.

Then I heard the creak of our screen door, way over by the house.

I turned back in time to see Sue-Anne glide onto the porch. She halted beneath the light, a swirl of moths wreathing her head. For a moment she remained there, peaceful and still.

Then that full-body shudder racked her body.

I’d been waiting for it. That made it even worse.

Her chest jerked a few times.

We watched her eyes turn black and disintegrate. We watched those tunnels swivel across the landscape and lock onto us. Her spine curled, and she leapt from the porch, landing on all fours, then springing up onto her bare feet. She sprinted at us faster than she should have been able to, her muscles strained to the breaking point. She was thirty feet away. I blinked, and then it was twenty.

Her hair flew about her face, her lips stretched thin with effort. She had tugged the sash free from her bathrobe, and it flapped wildly behind her.

Patrick chambered another shell.

Entry 8

ENTRY 8

We didn’t want to take the time to dig graves, so we laid Jim and Sue-Anne side by side on their bed in the master upstairs. It was a messy business, but after everything they’d done for us, we owed them that. We set up Rocky and JoJo in the living room watching TV so they wouldn’t have to see the terrible state of our aunt and uncle.