Chapter 9

Finn’s sleep was plagued with nightmares. In them, he found himself in a foggy graveyard at night. Dead trees stood around the graves and purple-eyed snakes hung from their branches like stalactites in a cave. While the reptiles were creepy and their eyes followed every move he made, they weren’t the cause of his crippling fear.

The gravestones all around him had names plastered on them in red, bloody letters. They looked as if they had been finger-painted onto the stones. The names were those of the people Finn had Mama Caplata curse. Thunder and lightning cracked overhead, opening up the dark clouds and pouring rain down upon him. The rain looked and smelled normal, but as it hit the soft earth within the graveyard, it sizzled and snapped as if it were acid. The ground soaked up the sky’s offering as if it were dying from thirst.

He looked around the graveyard, following the white picket fence along its boundary. The area beyond simply didn’t exist. It was nothing but complete darkness. Black as eternal death.

The ground started to pulse as if breathing, and his feet squished down into the soft soil. Grimy fingers burst their way through the grass in front of a gravestone. Then a second set appeared beside it. Fingers were followed by wrists, which were followed by arms and elbows. A head pushed through as if a corpse was being birthed from the earth, clots of dirt breaking apart to unveil the disgusting skull. The gravestone behind the ghoul read DANIEL WILSON, and as Finn focused in on the face, he saw that it was in fact Daniel.

“Fiiiiinnnnn,” the rotted face called. Mud poured from its gaping jaw and slimy worms tumbled from its empty eye sockets. “You did this to me! You did this to all of us!”

All around the graveyard grotesque figures were coming out of the ground in front of every blood-smeared stone. Their pain-filled groans set off a terror in Finn’s heart that he’d never felt before. He was frozen in place with fear. Paralyzed by the macabre scene unfolding before him.

“You cursed us, Finn,” they all hissed in unison like some unholy choir. “You cursed us, and now you must join us!”

Regaining control of his muscles, Finn tried to run but found himself physically stuck to the spot. He looked down and saw that he’d sunk into the wet soil up to his shins. The living dead drew closer, and he started to cry.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you!” Finn yelled over the sound of the storm. “I was just trying to make life better for myself!”

Daniel’s corpse was now mere feet from him. “You’re selfish, and you must live with the consequences of your choices. No more running, Finn.”

A clap of thunder shook the graveyard and lightning lit up the sky. At that very moment the snakes that were hanging from the trees dropped to the ground with a chorus of splats. The resting place of the dead turned into a slithering mangle of cold-blooded reptiles and even colder corpses. Finn was pulled down into the mud to his chest and the snakes slithered around his face. A boney hand gripped his hair and pushed his face forward into the mud. He couldn’t breathe. He tried to beg for mercy, but his mouth and nostrils filled with dirty water.

And that’s when he woke up, gasping for air and swinging for the blaring alarm clock. His sheets were drenched with sweat and his heart was racing. He took a few deep breaths and eventually got his mind under enough control to get out of bed.

He stayed in the shower for almost half an hour, just letting the water cascade over him. It took a while to shake off the cobwebs and the overwhelming feeling of impending doom. He’d never had a nightmare so vivid.

By the time he was sitting at the kitchen table, eating a bowl of cereal, the fear from the dream had melted away like wax on a candle. He allowed his critical mind to take over, and figured that the nightmare was probably the worst that would come of the so-called curse.

* * *

Finn received quite the surprise in his economics class, later in the day. The class was small, as it was an elective course, and the desks were situated in twos throughout the room. He was the lucky student who didn’t have to share his desk space with anyone, as the class had an odd number of students.

As Finn walked into class—early, as he usually was—Mrs. Sorros stopped him at the door.

“Good morning, Finn,” she said. “Just a heads-up that we’re getting a new student in class today and they’ll be sitting at the desk next to yours. I know you usually put your book bag in the empty desk, but please put it under your desk today. We want to be welcoming of our new student.”

“So this is a brand-new student?”

“This is their first year here, yes.”

Finn nodded acknowledgment and sat down at his desk. He took out his economics binder and a pencil, then stowed his book bag under his seat. The book bag was new, as his last one had been soiled on Tuesday after he’d used it as a seat cover for the drive home.

He looked up at the clock. Three minutes until the bell rang. He wondered who it could be. Was it a foreign exchange student? A girl? An attractive girl? Whoever it was, he assumed they’d be intelligent, as the school’s economics course was known for being tough. Plus, it was an elective, and not necessary for students to graduate high school. The class was almost full.

Then the bell rang.

No new student. Maybe Mrs. Sorros was confused and the new student was in a different period. He grabbed his book bag and was about to sling it into the desk seat beside him when he heard a voice he recognized.

It couldn’t be possible. Was his luck really that bad?

“Yes, your seat is right over there next to Finn,” Mrs. Sorros said, her voice sounding very far away.

Finn looked up to see REDACTED walking toward him.