She poked her head up through the opening and was surprised to see that the loft was full of hay. Most of the wires holding the hay into bales had broken long ago, and rotten straw had fanned out all over the floor, leaving a thin, yellow carpet.
Lisa was standing in the open loft doorway, looking out at the brightly lit woods. She was leaning with one arm on the door frame, her other hand cocked on her hip.
“I don’t think the world could look any prettier than it does from up here,” she said, not bothering to turn around as Angie hoisted herself up through the trap door opening and came slowly toward her.
Again, Angie was struck by how the woods seen from inside the barn looked strangely unreal, shimmering, like a fantasy world. “It
is
nice,” she said, leaning on the other side of the open loft doorway. She inhaled slowly through her nostrils to clear out the dust and musty smell from down below.
“I used to spend hours and hours, just sitting here, looking out,” Lisa said, her voice hushed with remembered awe. “I got so I thought I knew every tree and stone and bush like they were friends.”
“Didn’t you have any friends to play with?” Angie asked.
Lisa shrugged. “I’d hang around with some of the kids from school, but you know, this town is weird. I mean, not spooky weird, like those stupid towns in scary movies where everyone has a deep, dark secret. But to most of the kids, I was a stranger, and it was a really long time before they accepted me.”
“I’ll bet,” Angie said, only half paying attention. Her own thoughts were turning again to how much she was going to miss Larry; and this lonely, old barn seemed too sad.
“Uh-oh!” Lisa said, suddenly standing up straight and stiffening. She looked at Angie, then dropped to a crouch inside the doorway. “Get down!”
“What?” Angie said, following Lisa’s example and flattening herself against the barn wall.
“Shhh! There’s someone coming,” Lisa hissed. “I can hear ’em over there.” She indicated the direction with a quick nod of the head. Cautiously, Angie leaned forward and looked out, careful to keep in the shadow inside the doorway. Sure enough, she could see some kind of motion through the thick brush, and when she concentrated, she could hear the heavy tread of feet.
“Can you see ’em?” Lisa asked, unable to look for herself without revealing herself fully.
“I think it’s some men,” Angie said. She held one finger up to her lips, and waited, watching. The muscles in her thighs tightened, getting ready to run; her left leg started to tremble. The only real problem she saw was that the ground was far below her.
The footsteps got louder, and the two girls clearly could hear the snapping of branches as several people made their way toward the barn.
“Why do you think they’re here?” Angie whispered.
Lisa shrugged, clinging to the barn wall.
“What are we gonna do?” Angie asked, her voice tight and dry. She was afraid she was going to throw up.
Lisa shook her head. “I dunno. Maybe they’re just passing by. Let’s just stay here and hope they don’t see us.”
“Oh God, Lisa! I’m scared!” Angie whined.
“Just be quiet. We’ll be all right.”
The footsteps grew louder and louder, and then suddenly several people—Angie counted eight before she ducked deeper into the shadows stepped out of the forest, heading straight toward the old barn. Now she
knew
for sure she was going to throw up!
None of the people spoke as they crossed the clearing and entered the barn. Listening from above, Angie and Lisa could hear labored, watery breathing and deep-chest grunts, but neither one of them could imagine what these men were doing here. Angie merely glimpsed them as they approached, and her overriding impression was that they looked old and poorly clothed, like TV hoboes.
Moving as quietly as she could, Angie made her way over to Lisa. She cupped her hand to Lisa’s ear and whispered, “We’ve got to get out of here. Your grandmother and my dad are gonna be worried if we don’t show up at the house soon.”
“It sounds like they’re planning on staying down there for a while,” Lisa whispered back. “But why aren’t they talking?”
Angie shrugged. Now that Lisa mentioned it, it did seem strange that with eight or more men all together down there, that there was no conversation, but only their heavy breathing and what sounded like them shifting around, maybe sitting or lying down on the barn floor.
“You know what?” Lisa whispered, her breath hot in Angie’s ear. “I think they’re gonna be staying here for the night. It sounds like they’re settling down.”
“How are we gonna get out of here?” Angie said. She could feel her eyes stinging as tears welled up in her eyes, and she wanted nothing more than to be back at the house with her father.
“We’ll think of something,” Lisa said.
“You stay here,” Angie said. “I’ll tiptoe over to the trap door to see if I can figure out what they’re doing down there.”
Before Lisa could respond, Angie had started moving stealthily back across the loft floor, putting down her feet with the utmost care. Every now and then, a floorboard would creak under her weight and she would freeze in place, waiting for long-drawn out seconds to see if the men below responded. She kept glancing back at Lisa by the loft door, and they could read the growing terror in each other’s eyes.
Angie was a little more than halfway to the trap door when one floor board creaked particularly loudly. She stopped instantly, with one foot still in the air, but almost instantly she knew they were in trouble. From down below, the men shifted and grunted; the watery rattle of their breathing grew louder, sounding more agitated.
“Shit!
Angie!
” Lisa hissed.
Angie remembered the dust that had sifted down through the cracks in the ceiling when Lisa was up in the loft alone. She wondered if that’s what had alerted the men. Right now, though, it didn’t matter!
For several heartbeats, Angie stayed as she was, with one foot frozen in mid-air. A jolt of pain shot through her thigh muscle. Then she heard louder sounds of motion from below, and she knew it was time to act. This was
big
trouble! Quickly, she dashed over to loft door and, leaning into the opening, peered down. What she saw froze her blood.
In the dimness of the barn, there appeared to be more than eight men in the barn. It looked like there might be twenty or more. Her first impression was right, though; the men were wearing tattered, dirty clothes. Some wore pants with gaping holes in the knees or shirts with sleeves that hung from the shoulders by mere threads. She only had a second to register their faces, but what she saw sent waves of panic through her. Beneath the dirt, their skin looked pasty pale, almost transparent. As they looked up through the opening at her, their eyes glowed with a peculiar, dull gleam.
Thinking fast, Angie grabbed the trap door and, ripping it from the hook that held it open, slammed it down just as the man closest to the ladder gripped one of the rungs and started up. One small part of her mind registered that still none of the men had spoken. As if in mutual, unspoken agreement, they started together to come toward the loft ladder.
“
Lisa! What do I do?
” Angie wailed. She couldn’t shake the memory of those blank, dirty faces, staring up at her as she knelt on the trap door, hoping to keep it shut.
Lisa scrambled over to where Angie crouched and looked frantically around for anything they could use to keep the trap door closed. The best she could do was to grab one of the unbroken hay bales and start dragging it toward the trap door.
Angie let out a loud scream when a heavy blow hit the trap door with enough force to lift her into the air. Pain jolted her jaw, and she tried to ignore the splinter of wood that jabbed into the heel of her hand as she willed herself to be heavy enough to keep the door shut until
—until
when
?
—
what could they do?
Two girls couldn’t very well expect to hold off that many men all night, and sooner or later, one of them was sure to think of climbing up through the open loft doors!
“Hurry!
Hurry!
” Angie wailed, watching Lisa struggle to move the bale. The hay was old and rotten, and with each push, dust and chaff swirled like smoke into the air, choking Lisa and making her cough.
A heavy fist hammered in rapid succession on the trap door from below. Every hit jolted Angie, sending waves of pain up through her body. She shifted to one side to allow Lisa to push the hay bale on top of the door, but they both knew it wouldn’t be enough weight. Lisa quickly went back to get another.
It sounded now like two or more men were pounding on the door from below. Their efforts bounced Angie as if she were a rider on a bronco. Her frantic cries were nothing more than strangled whimpers, caught like fish bones in her throat.
Lisa grabbed another bale by the wires, but as she leaned back to pull, the wire snapped. She fell back in a shower of flying hay and pinwheeling arms, landing hard on her butt. Pain like a white heat shot up her tailbone.
“Come—
on
—Lisa!” Angie shouted. Her jaw was clenched tightly, distorting her words.
Lisa tried to move another bale, this time pushing it from behind. But once she moved it near the door, she realized that Angie would have to get off to make room for it. There was no way she could lift the new bale to put it on top of the other one.
Suddenly, one of the boards in the trap door exploded upward and a clenched fist shot up through the smashed wood in a choking swirl of dust. The long fingers extended and, before Angie could jump away, they grabbed her wrist. The hand clamped her like a shackle. Angie looked down, horrified, as dirt-crusted fingernails pressed into her skin.
“
Lisa!… Help!… Help me!
” she wailed as the hand pulled her down. Through the splintered door she saw a man’s face glaring up at her. His eyes flashed with a cold, dull anger. To Angie, the man looked hopelessly insane. His eyes glowered with a wild intensity and a wide grin split his face, exposing a row of stained and broken teeth. Black gunk rimmed his mouth and teeth, as though he had just eaten a mouthful of dirt. His tongue darted out at her, wiggling like a colorless slug, and a deep, rumbling laughter erupted from his chest.
The pressure on her wrist, pulling her down, was impossible to fight. Angie watched, horrified, as the man’s fingernails bit deeper into her flesh.
Now
, she thought, almost laughing aloud,
would be a great time to throw up! All over him!
“Lean back!” Lisa suddenly shouted. Angie didn’t notice during her struggle that Lisa had left the bale and was searching in a far corner of the loft. She came running back to the trap door now with a pitchfork. The tines were rusted and dull-looking, but still useful.
“Oh, shit! Be careful!” Angie said with a groan. She pulled back as far as she could and tensed, while the hand kept pulling her down.
Lisa knelt down and with a sudden grunt, drove the pitchfork home. The man bellowed as one of the pitchfork tines skewered his wrist and stuck out the other side. For an instant, his grip relaxed, and Angie took that instant to break free.
“Come on!” Lisa shouted.
Angie got off the trap door, and as soon as she did, it started to lift up. Lisa ran over to the open loft door, but before she followed her, Angie sat back and kicked the bale of hay through the opening door. She heard another bellow of anger but didn’t waste time to see what happened. She ran to where Lisa waited at the loft door.
“We’ve gotta jump!” Lisa shouted. “It’s our only chance!”
Angie didn’t pause to consider. She flexed her legs and shot out into the air, her arms and legs flailing for balance. The ground came up fast, and she hit it hard. She knocked the breath out of herself, and was only dimly aware of Lisa landing in a sprawl on the ground beside her.
They both looked frantically at the barn door, but none of the men had come out yet. Most likely, they were, even now, scrambling up the loft ladder, frantically looking for them.
“Let’s get moving!” Lisa shouted.
Fists clenched and hearts pounding, the girls ran as fast as they could into the woods. As they crested the hill and before the barn disappeared from sight, they slowed for a moment to see if they were being pursued.
Nothing. There was no sign of the men. The loft door hung open, a black empty rectangle, but no leering faces leaned out, watching them. The barn looked entirely deserted, and what had just happened seemed little more than a dream.
“Let’s boogie before they come,” Lisa said, tugging Angie’s sleeve. Turning quickly, the girls found the path and ran as fast as they could until the roof peak of Lisa’s grandmother’s house came into view. Then they stopped and, panting heavily, sides aching, tried to catch their breath.
“I don’t… want to go in… yet,” Angie gasped, bent at the waist. Then she noticed the gray splinter sticking in the base of her thumb. Her fingers were sticky with blood starting to dry to a dark, brick red. Wincing, she took hold of the splinter end and, with one quick flick, pulled it out. Fresh blood started to flow, falling to the ground with a faint
plop-plop
.
“Hey, Lisa,” she said, her voice still cut by gasps. “Thanks for… showing me that… place.” She squeezed the wound to make it bleed more to clean it out.