What They Do in the Dark - By Amanda Coe Page 0,10
to be watching, there are a number of things I don’t understand. I’m dying to ask Dad to explain the plot for me, but can’t risk drawing attention to myself. A man and a lady in a dark, scary old house are looking for someone who’s missing – the lady’s sister? Why do they know she’s in the house?
The house looks a lot like Lallie’s mansion, although in Lallie’s show you only ever see her room and sometimes the dining room. There’s a scary old man who keeps telling the main man and lady to ‘leave this place’, but they don’t pay any attention. As they’re looking for the missing sister or whoever she is, the lady opens a door and sees someone in the other room. It’s another lady, probably the sister, but she has her back to the main lady, so you can only see her blonde hair and pretty dress. The main lady says ‘Judy?’ but the sister doesn’t say anything so she taps her on the shoulder, and the sister turns round suddenly and it’s not her face but a skull, grinning horribly, with a rat running out between her teeth. The lady on the television screams at the same time as me, but not as loud. Mum runs down the stairs and wants to know what the matter is. Dad looks confused and foggy – I realize he has been asleep in his chair and not watching the film at all. My heart is still punching hard from the shock. ‘This isn’t fit for her to be watching,’ says Mum, and packs me off to bed. Even though I get her to leave the landing light on, I don’t go to sleep for ages in case I see that empty-eyed skull in my dreams.
It troubles me for days, and I make all sorts of excuses about going to bed. One night I jerk awake and think I see the corpse hovering in the corner near the door, blonde hair billowing around it, then wake up properly with a scream thick and unscreamed in my throat. And this is how Pauline Bright draws me in. I’m playing two-ball with Christina and some other girls at morning playtime, and I see her chasing after a couple of the rough boys in our year, Neil Rigby and Darren Soper. Pauline spends a lot of playtimes on her own, but if she does play with anyone apart from her brother or sister, it’s with boys like them. Sometimes she tries to barge in on skipping or a game of two-ball with the girls, but when there’s enough of us we gang up and chase her away, telling her she smells. If she’s in the mood, she lets the boys snog her and touch her where they shouldn’t, but she always demands to touch their willies in return. Other times she just fights them, and she’s quite capable of making them run off crying to tell a teacher. Today she’s after Neil and Darren, her jaw thrust forward and eyes hideously crossed, legs spastic and arms outstretched; a monster.
‘So then she turns round and she’s like this, right –’ she shouts, ‘and she jumps out on you, but you can’t gerraway and she pulls you back in – there’s like a secret passage and she pulls you in through the cupboard and that’s where she keeps you and there’s all these other people she’s caught and she eats their flesh and that.’
Pauline catches Neil by the back of his jumper. He stretches it to the limit, arms wheeling, but can’t escape.
‘Some are just skellingtons,’ continues Pauline, still shouting. ‘That’s all that’s left of them and she’s even eaten your sister you were looking for, but then you escape—’
She lets Neil’s jumper go and he runs off round a corner. She staggers after him, pulling a fresh monster face. Christina fumbles the ball on a simple overarm against the wall – not even over-under – and it’s my turn. I have to concentrate on the game.
In the dinner queue I manoeuvre a place next to Pauline. It’s risky, given her threats to do me since our fight on the playing field, but I can’t resist.
‘Did you see that film on Saturday night?’ I ask her. I’m anxious, both in case she says no and in case she says yes. ‘The one in the mansion when the sister’s gone missing and the lady jumps out but she’s got a skeleton face?’