“You just going to stand there, man?”
“What am I supposed to do?” I ask.
“Meredith kissed you — she’s like one of the most popular girls in the school, and she kissed you. No offense, Stanley, but we are kind of like outcasts, and she kissed you right in front of the entire school, and now you don’t know what to do? You’re just going to stand there while she—”
“While she what?” I snap.
“Let’s just let our imagination run wild,” Jonathan says. “Let’s see, while she gets kidnapped? Turned into a zombie? Or a werewolf—”
“Jonathan,” I say. “Shut up.”
“Or how about while she gets eaten by a vampire? Or maybe while she gets turned into a vampire? But why stop there? Maybe she’ll be possessed by something from that gateway? Or what was it Enrique’s great-grandmother mentioned? Human sacrifice?”
My hands clench into fists, my teeth grind together, and I feel and smell the change all around me.
“I said shut up!” I growl, but Jonathan is already quiet. A single horn note blows, far off in the distance.
Across the street, far to our left, three of the zombies tentatively step into the street. And they don’t pull back.
Not only that, but my phone is buzzing. I look down.
There is a text message from an unknown sender.
“THE CEREMONY IS ABOUT TO BEGIN.”
Chapter 30: RUNNING IN THE WOODS
Jonathan grabs the phone out of my hand and reads the message. “‘The ceremony is about to begin?’” he says. “I have a nasty feeling about this. Who sent you these messages?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. It says ‘Unknown Sender.’”
“I need to go tell my brother,” Enrique says, and walks out of the room.
“Hello, the zombies?” I say, but he’s already gone.
I’m left with Jonathan, staring out into the night.
“You don’t think this house has any of those sigils on it, do you, Jonathan?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Nope,” he says. “The house itself is totally unprotected.”
“How about yours?” I ask him.
“I penciled things all over around the doors and windows. Had to be real careful so my brother Carver didn’t see me. If I’d known he was in this brotherhood thing, I would have asked him to help me.”
“Never mind that now,” I say. Do you think you could put sigils on the doors here and on my house? We need to keep those zombies away.”
Jonathan looks uncertain. “It’s got to be harder in the dark, and what will your parents think if they see me?”
“By now my parents will be out trick-or-treating with Josh.”
“And?”
“They always trick-or-treat over by my aunt’s house. She’s outside of Lansfeld. They’ll probably stay there until Josh conks out. So we should have a few hours, at least.”
“All right,” says Jonathan. He pulls out a book and starts looking through it, then nods. “Yes.”
“Can you do it?” I ask him, looking across the street. The zombies that have stepped into the street have backed up, back on the sidewalk. Hurrah for Karen! She must have chalked up a storm on the street.